Waymo Launches Fully Driverless Service in Las Vegas, with Denver, San Diego, and Tampa to Follow

On July 8, Waymo, the self-driving unit of Alphabet, announced the launch of fully driverless operations in Las Vegas, with vehicles no longer staffed by safety drivers. The company also stated that Denver, San Diego, and Tampa will be the next cities to receive its service. This expansion brings the total number of cities offering Waymo’s fully driverless service to four and advances its goal of completing one million paid rides per week by the end of 2026. Services in the three new cities will “follow soon after,” with local users able to receive launch notifications through the Waymo app. Previously, Waymo had conducted months-long testing in multiple target cities—including Las Vegas—with human safety operators onboard. The shift to fully driverless mode marks the official transition of these pilot programs into commercial robotaxi services. To date, Waymo operates approximately 3,500 robotaxis and has completed over 20 million total trips. Earlier this year, the company was providing around 500,000 paid rides per week across its existing markets: Phoenix, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Austin, Atlanta, Miami, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and Orlando. In May, Waymo expanded its total service area across 11 U.S. cities to more than 1,400 square miles. The company is now deploying the Ojai vehicle—a purpose-built robotaxi equipped with its sixth-generation “Driver” hardware system, marking Waymo’s first vehicle designed from the ground up for autonomous ride-hailing. Tekedra Mawakana, Waymo’s co-CEO, described reaching one million weekly rides as a business “inflection point” and outlined plans to expand into international markets such as London and Tokyo once this milestone is achieved. Notably, Tampa was not included in Waymo’s initial 2026 expansion list released earlier this year. Its addition makes Florida the second state—after Orlando—to host two Waymo service areas. Compared to Tesla, Waymo is expanding at a faster pace. Tesla launched its Robotaxi service in Austin in June 2025 with a fleet of roughly 20 vehicles covering about 245 square miles of the Austin metropolitan area. Although Tesla has removed in-car safety drivers, its vehicles still rely on remote operators to take control at low speeds to reposition stranded cars. Tesla aims to achieve large-scale deployment by late 2026 or early 2027 via version 15 of its “Full Self-Driving” software. Analysts note that Tampa’s inclusion demonstrates Waymo’s ability to both execute its existing roadmap and continuously add new targets. However, operating fully driverless services across more than 14 markets entails significant costs, the new Ojai hardware remains in its early stages, and achieving the one-million-weekly-rides target by year-end poses considerable challenges.