Comparison of Tesla robotaxi vs Waymo service area in Austin, Texas

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This tallies with the official Robotaxi account which reposted a similar graphic and [said](https://x.com/robotaxi/status/1983290793642340689): > Now available in even more of Austin

Supervised robotaxi vs autonomous driving taxis*

You think Waymo isn't supervised? It is, it's just remote and they can take control of the vehicle if there's an issue.

I think some of this might be because, IIRC, Waymo avoids highways.

Thanks for sharing! I built RoboTracker to make it easy to follow the robotaxi expansions of Waymo, Tesla and Zoox in all the USA. More cities and interactive map available here: https://robotracker.app/cities

will get larger faster from here as the burbs are less dense and there is less traffic

Thats not the meaning of supervised.

No they can't. That's not how it works

Means nothing without including miles driven and rides. Robotaxi is just a marketing gimmick but Waymo is an actual ride-sharing service

Comparing the two is like comparing apples to asteroids. Tesla isn’t even playing in the same league here.

And Waymo doesn’t have any employee in the car. Just not really comparable until robotaxi is on its own with no training wheels.

Why do we see stuck Waymo’s if there is someone supervising it?

It could aswell be the whole state, doesnt matter when there is a driver in the driver seat.

Is waymo so much better? Like for real, I actually have no idea.

Yes. They are actual autonomous vehicles with a full sensor suite.

not anymore

Tesla is in a pilot with a driver in the seat. Waymo had already been doing that for nearly a decade in multiple cities before they actually switched to full unsupervised driving. A more apt comparison would be Uber vs Tesla.

I would still say Tesla havent accomplised a single mile as a robotaxi.

There's no one in the driver seat in Austin. If you're going to spam negativity in the comments, at least look up what you're talking about.

Waymo took years to get to this point, Tesla took months, and the safety monitor in the car will not be required by the end of the year. Tesla can put this software into a million vehicles overnight, Waymo can make a thousand or so cars per year. Regulatory hurdles will be the bottleneck for widespread access, but once it has proven reliable it will probably expand quickly. Watch a couple of dirty tesla's videos, it is not perfect yet but it is definitely not a gimmick.

LOL

No. Waymo feels like a HW3 car on V11. It’s jerky and makes robotic movements.

Yes everything hinges on whether Tesla can actually get FSD to be unsupervised - as a daily FSD user that just does seem remotely imminent at this point. I get the scale argument but the only reason Tesla is doing robotaxi right now is for appearances not because they're hot on Waymo's heels. I've watched all the robotaxi videos. It's a gimmick.

No, no, it took 2 weeks! I guess a decade of FSD beta testing on owners didn’t go towards achieving what the Robotaxi is built on?

>Tesla is in a pilot with a driver in the seat I'm fairly sure, at least in Texas, the safety driver sits in the passenger seat. >A more apt comparison would be Uber vs Tesla. Does Uber have a self driving program? Because robotaxi drives itself.

There's no one in the driver's seat in the Austin RoboTaxis. There's a safety monitor in the front passenger seat.

I just installed FSD 14.1.4 and haven't felt the need to touch the controls since.

When waymo drives them in loops in neighborhoods to up their miles driven numbers, you think they bother to monitor that?

Now do Shenzhen, China. You know, Americans are 300 million people, right?China middle class is 1 billion. To put in perspective. ;) But yep buy TSLA stock

Yes. Nvidia announced a partnership with Uber yesterday.

There are lots of Waymo’s driving around south of the 105 in Los Angeles.

I’ve been in both. It’s just another way to get around.

How do you define “take control”? Latency of hundreds of milliseconds is a non-starter for traditional “wheel and pedal” control. A human in the car is going to react much faster than a human in a remote operations center with 5G (+other systems it needs to pass through).

I’ve taken Robotaxi several times, not sure how it’s a gimmick

> Waymo took years to get to this point, Tesla took months Elon said in 2019 that there will be million robotaxis deployed in 2020. It's not a project they have started few months ago but one they have worked on for years. Also waymo has no supervisor, is open to public and available in multiple cities. With current robotaxi implementation they can claim they cover entire US. It doesn't matter because it's only few cars for select people. > safety monitor in the car will not be required by the end of the year There is entire wiki article documenting claims on when this will happen from Elon. They go back 10 years. > Tesla can put this software into a million vehicles overnight, Waymo can make a thousand or so cars per year. Robotaxi service requires mapping, same as Waymo. They don't call it mapping but validation but functionally it's the same. They need to drive around the place with special lidar equipped cars before enabling it. If Waymo goes to car manufacturer and tells them they will buy a million customzed cars, they will get a million customized cars. > Watch a couple of dirty tesla's videos, it is not perfect yet but it is definitely not a gimmick. While impressive, the problem is critical disengagements still happen to often for them to remove supervisors. Even the new version gets tons of complaints. Many people saying that while parking at the endpoint is great it still has issues with brake stabbing and swerving for shadows.

If that's such an easy solution then Tesla should try it.

Tesla took months to get to this point? Lol is this meant to be a serious comment? Just because Tesla has only recently *announced* the Robotaxi, doesn’t mean that it hasn’t been in the works for years. In Austin, Waymo‘s are absolutely everywhere. You cannot stand at one single intersection in Austin and not see at least one Waymo, if not see 3-4 at the same stoplight. Not only is their service area larger but they are heavily dominating the numbers as well.

How many taxis are Tesla running there now? Still the same 12 to 20?

More sensors doesn’t automatically mean better. My Tesla on FSD actually got impatient at a Waymo when it was being too hesitant at a right turn on red (when it was allowed and there was light traffic). It went around the Waymo and successfully made the turn Obviously that’s just one example but it surprises me often. It also scares me often when it changes lanes when the lane it’s merging into is ending

https://electrek.co/2025/09/03/tesla-moves-robotaxi-safety-monitor-passenger-drivers-seat/ They moved it back to the passenger seat now? Not that it really matters, the driver is ready to intervene any given second no matter which seat its seated in, aka supervised.

Waymo is self driving, FSD is not. FSD maybe feels better because it can afford taking risks, chance, hope for the best because when it screws up a driver is ready to intervene. That is the big difference, compared to waymo.

They did in California during the event they had last year for the robotaxi with no steering wheel or pedals Dozens of miles accumulated in the geofenced area of Universal Studios Come to think of it, those robotaxis drive around Tesla in Austin as well according to the guy who flies drones over the plant almost daily

Because your Tesla can afford taking risks that potentially can result in a crash, because You are there to intervene when it screws up. Waymo have to be careful, FSD can just send it and hope for the best with no liability.

Sounds like your Tesla probably broke a law.

It used to depend whether there is a highway on the route. Did it change?

The first time I turned fsd on it blew through a red light

Hey, either take a polarizing stance or get out of here! (jk)

Nothing a human driver wouldn’t do. Nearly everyone, including FSD, goes above the speed limit on highways yet that’s fine.

Yes, had a hw3 with fsd for a month and it sucked. It drove into the middle of an intersection and stopped almost got me killed. Went to Cali and tried Waymo for the first time and my friends who hate “robots” and all Tesla stuff loved it and wish it’ll come to nyc

With passengers?

Anyone can get a Waymo. Robotaxi is still influencer only. But to be fair a buddy of mine tried Waymo recently in Austin and he said it sucked. V13 drives better than Waymo according to him. Not sure why Tesla is keeping Robotaxi influencers only.

I’m still pickin Waymo. I’ve had nothing but an amazing experience with Waymo every time. FSD is super sketchy in my city.

>China middle class is 1 billion. Not according to China it isn't. (500 million is still an impressive figure, so not sure why you felt the need to inflate it.) [https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/3253995/chinas-middle-income-population-passes-500-million-mark-says-state-owned-newspaper](https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/3253995/chinas-middle-income-population-passes-500-million-mark-says-state-owned-newspaper)

Austin RoboTaxi isn’t influencer only anymore. I have access to it and I’m a nobody. Waymo also has to be called through the Uber app so you’re not guaranteed getting one which sucks compared to Phoenix or the Bay Area where it’s a dedicated app. I’ve never been paired with a Waymo in Austin.

Show a video of it driving loops in a neighborhood.

Tesla has what, 15 vehicles operating in this entire area, still only open to influencers they've approved? It's still just a novelty gimmick that they're frantically trying to figure out. Waymo is actually a self driving taxi

No it isn't. Tesla Robotaxi Is Now Open To All In Austin. Here’s What It’s Like https://www.forbes.com/sites/scottyreiss/2025/09/04/tesla-robotaxi-is-now-open-to-all-in-austin-heres-what-its-like/

I like Waymo and expect them to add highways soon but as of right now typical passengers cannot use highways. Closed Beta test. Now it should be noted that Tesla is arguably also on a Closed Beta Test for highways as they're still in closed beta test mode for the entire robotaxi network which I do think is important to note.

Yes. I regularly see them with passengers on El Segundo Blvd.

700 million more than US. Let’s say all 300 million people in US are middle class.

They're testing with employee riders on highways, but I haven't seen any news that they're open to the public on the highway.

Does that mean that come parts of Austin are only connected by highways? Edit: thanks for the downvotes. Just an honest question.

Love the simplicity. Maybe as a feature update in the future, I'd like to see a separate colour for if there's a "safety monitor" in the car ready to take over.

robotaxi is open to the public in Austin, you just need to download the app and be in the area

Hey, and he will only miss his own deadline for a million Robotaxis by six years! What an accomplishment!

And for what we know they were remotely supervised all the time with a person ready to hit a emergency stop button. They drove around slow in a closed area with no traffic, the routes were preprogrammed. This have been done in amusements park decades ago. There was nothing remotely impressive about that pr stunt. Comparing that to waymo is just pathetic.

It means that some areas would take too long to get to without using the highway, so they’re not included. For example an area takes 15mins to get to on the highway, but 1:20hr without.

I didn't say a word about the US. And, as I said, 500 million for a middle class is already such an impressive figure that you inflating it to 1 billion isn't necessary. 500 million is already > 300 million, eh?

My understanding is you get put on a wait list, and they're still only approving Tesla-paid/friendly influencers. Can you show me where you're seeing the general public access and auccess in using it? Last I read theere were still only 15 cars total for that entire area.

Good, if you extend this streak of a couple of days (?) ten more years maybe its close to be approved for unsupervised FSD. Ofcourse in all possible weather conditions and road situations.

This is just the bullshit Elon is trying to make a narrative to justify cheaping out on radar and lidar in their cars even when it's a proven fact that they affect the cars navigation a lot

I have 14.1.4 also and I have multiple times already. Also, just read the FSD forum to see how many issues people are having with v14. Imagine if those cars were driving around without a person to intervene.

It’s not really open to all if there is a waitlist. I am still waiting and I’ve had the app since it dropped.

Agreed of course, but 700 million compared to 300 million US citizens is still impressive number. Speaking as a guy married to Asian lady. ;)

But it's not influencer-only, which is the comment I was responding to.

One works the other is shit with a guy in there 😂

Let me know when the first Tesla without safety driver is on the roads. Right now the zone is effectively 0x0 miles. It's not autonomous.

Tesla has Way Mo’ coverage

So it's not autonomous then. Got it.

15 cars is about right, they also have safety drives in the actual drivers seat for the robotaxis that go on highways “until they get more data”

I don’t think that logic holds up. More surface area means more edge cases that need testing…less traffic means SLOWER collection of that confirmation data which means a slower roll out

You sounded as if Tesla won’t need remote support??

I will wager any dollar amount that Robotaxis will have safety drivers by the end of the year. I may set up a Polymarket bet just to bet true believers.

In that case, this image posted is a completely misleading comparison?

Didn’t they initially start out with a supervisor in the passenger seat but then moved them to the driver’s seat when the new law took effect in Austin?

Human drivers break laws all the time, to the tune of 40,000 deaths per year. AKA a death every 15 minutes. The whole point of autonomous vehicles is that they’re safer than human drivers. Arguing “Tesla drives just like human drivers!” Is the worst possible excuse you could give

You only asked for autonomous miles ...

And the answer would be zero miles.

They also drive to the shipping lot. Off the line

You should totally do that. It would basically be free money.

We need another color for robotaxi without human

For all practical intents and purposes, its influencer only if the “invítes” are only going to them them…

I'm sure it's "two weeks away!"

https://www.reddit.com/r/waymo/s/yemAdssMG0 https://www.reddit.com/r/mountainview/s/LfEVMbPoEI https://www.reddit.com/r/waymo/s/iJwBE48cES

Why does anyone care if the is a driver or no driver? YOU are not driving. It’s bringing you to your destination. I think people are getting lost in details. Robotaxi actually costs less than Waymo at the moment and it provides better coverage in Austin. Would you take the stairs in a building only because there was an elevator operator touching the buttons instead of you doing it? Probably not. 40 years ago, that was still a thing.

Your attitude is the reason no one innovated in the space industry since Apollo was over. It has to be absolutely perfect or its canned before even trying it.

Was Waymo also a marketing gimmick when it first started? They had safety monitors for over 2 years.

What do you consider autonomous? There is no one driving the car, except for the car itself.

https://electrek.co/2025/09/03/tesla-moves-robotaxi-safety-monitor-passenger-drivers-seat/ They're in the driver's seat because even in Texas they won't let them on the highway otherwise

https://electrek.co/2025/09/03/tesla-moves-robotaxi-safety-monitor-passenger-drivers-seat/ Tldr they're in the driver's seat because Texas won't let them on the highway otherwise

Uber and Waymo are one and the same in Austin. You can only book Waymo through Uber here. Uber doesn’t have their own autonomous vehicles on the road for passenger rides currently.

Now post the number of cars and trips per day stats.

Not really, but it would take ages to make trips that far by only using side streets. Probably the only major thing only reachable by divided highway is the airport, which Waymo doesn’t reach yet probably for that reason.

IMO the only reason Tesla stretches out way into east Austin is because that’s where the Tesla plant is, as well as a ton of housing that’s been built in its vicinity for their workers. There isn’t much in far east Austin other than Tesla, it’s pretty lightly populated out there. They would have reached far higher population density going north and northwest of their current coverage area instead of that far east where there’s still a ton of open land out there.

To be honest Im quite confident to say that self driving cars have to be more perfect than the space program ever has been, the stakes are a lot higher. People on the road that are in the danger zone havent signed any waiver that they are ready to risk their life for Elon to fulfil his promises from years ago.

I just tried Waymo in Austin and after one ride I will never take a human uber/lyft again if possible, it’s infinitely better than the human driving experience. Not sure what your buddy was on about or why he had a bad experience but if you ever get the chance take one for sure. Anyways I’m in Denver currently where Waymo is testing next and cannot wait until anyone can get a Waymo here.

Yes, I’m sure the “safest” thing to do is put $300,000 of sensors on every car…except then no one could afford them, and then your point is moot because they won’t get used. By continually working toward a “cheaper” solution, Tesla’s system is the superior path to full adoption. If you would spend less time hating Elon, maybe you could think a bit more objectively. 🤷🏼‍♂️

Wow! Tesla covers Waymo area compared to the alternative

300k? If an iphone that costs 500$ to make can have a lidar sensor, a tesla car can surely afford it. Basic radar antennas are about 1k too.

How is the Robotaxi? How often do you use it?

..but I guess we can count like you want to, then I would say about every single car manufactor does many autonomous miles every day in all countries around the world. Because a car with cruise control and lane assist is practically driving itself. Ofcourse I wouldnt say that its a self driving car, but be my guest…

Seems like Waymo covers Wayless 🤣

🤦🏼‍♂️

Don’t argue with these clowns. Could be no one in the car and they’d say someone is hiding in the trunk I bet

Only rode it once and it was great, no issues at all. Cost was much cheaper than Uber/Lyft. This latest expansion covers my house so as soon as airport pickup/drop off gets approved, I'll only call Robotaxi's to get to and from the airport. It wasn't a complicated route that I took so it felt the same as FSD just with nobody in the driver seat.

If you don't care if there is a driver, why not compare the coverage area to uber or lyft. That is a more valid comparison.

It should be. I don’t have that data; and it’s irrelevant. It’s all ride hailing

The data is pretty much 100% of the country.

Yup!

> safety monitor in the car will not be required by the end of the year 3 months maybe, 6 months definitely?

Don't forget about the coast-to-coast autonomous drive "definitely" happening in 2017.

Because we've been able to have a person in an electric car take us somewhere without us having to drive since the Bersey Electric Cab was introduced in 1897.

This will age poorly

Yes, at the bare minimum it should be labeled on the graphic. Previously I was confident that Tesla would switch the entire geofence to no-safety monitor this year when it was made public as well but the way Elon said "parts of Austin" which makes me think we're going to be geofencing within geofencing. So ultimately bad comparison.

Well its true now, but maybe next year..

Taxis have been around for 125 years.

Tesla has had supervision for 10 years.

That isnt true anymore. You can now specifically request a Waymo.

I didnt have fsd in my tesla in Germany so I cannot compare that. But I visited San Francisco earlier this month and waymo is truly amazing. It drives at minimum as good as a human. There were several maneuvers thay waymo did better than humans. My experience with waymo is SF was significantly better than with Uber in SF

Not for it's robotaxi service it hasn't. If you're going to act like this, then Waymo first started its testing in 2012, so also had supervision for 10 years.

Took my first Waymo ride while in LA this weekend. It struggled to navigate around double parked cars and had to have a remote operator intervene twice on one intersection, but otherwise felt pretty seamless. While I haven’t tried Tesla or Uber offerings, I feel it’s only fair to compare a truly driverless experience where no one but you and your passengers are in the car. You can draw any map, but when it boils down to it, passengers who opt for autonomous taxis do so expecting an empty car. Until all companies have this, it’s just semantic comparison between fans and haters IMO.

> Not for it's robotaxi service it hasn't. What's the difference? Isn't it supposed to be the same thing? > If you're going to act like this, then Waymo first started its testing in 2012, so also had supervision for 10 years. Waymo started their supervised rides in 2017, and they removed the supervisors in 2020.

The difference is Robotaxi has no one in the drivers seat, and FSD in customer cars does. Waymo started testing in 2012, just like Telsa started testing FSD 10 years ago as you mentioned.

> The difference is Robotaxi has no one in the drivers seat, and FSD in customer cars does. That difference is minimal when you consider that in both cases the supervisor can stop the vehicle. Additionally, Tesla has moved the supervisors into the drivers seat.

I, for one, am super grateful that everyone thinks Tesla robotaxi is a joke. Giving me precious precious months to scrape every last coin from under my couch to buy the stock. Autonomos vehicle platforms are projected to be quite valuable markets compared to, I dunno, selling cars. But that's just me. Thanks all👍

Only on highway rides, which Waymo is also doing but not with the public. You seem to be quite uninformed for someone so invested in this.

Arguing against Tesla on a Tesla sub? You're pretty bold 🫡

People here fighting Waymo vs Tesla is funnier than memes I've seen today lol. Keep up the entertainment!

Except they're not. Plenty of random people have access.

You actually think an iPhone lidar is viable on a car? Lmao

They did that in August. I haven't seen any rides with them in the passenger seat since September when the law in Texas changed. I could be wrong though. But at least you've stopped pretending their supervision is so different from FSD supervision.

Anyone else still on the waitlist? Had access on day one but had it removed shortly after.. Hadn’t even taken a ride yet.

Means nothing unless they can scale up the operating fleet

Waymo doesn't have a remote stop button?

They keyword here is supervised, that a human being is constantly supervising a car driving around ready to intervene, obviously this isnt the case with Waymo even if the surely can do it if they want to. But Waymos scale makes it kind of unlikely that they are supervising all their cars 24/7

Why would I want a self driving vehicle that ignores the law and takes unnecessary risks? I can do that myself, negating any need for a self driving vehicle. (Which frankly, is my general opinion. I like to drive and have no intention of ever letting a car do it for me)

Comparing these two is kind of a joke. Waymo is so far ahead.

Yeah that's fair. You're definitely right at this very moment. I believe this is like Blackberry vs iPhone moment playing out again.

LIES LIES AND MORE LIES

A robotaxi isn’t a robotaxi if an employee is being paid to sit in the car since the whole point is to not have to pay a human.

I trust Waymo-re

And Waymo uses high definition maps of every road they travel on. Tesla doesn't bother Let's see who is safer once Tesla dares to release safety data

Going slightly over the speed limit is not comparable to running a red light. Generally going the speed of cars around you is safer than going the speed limit. Running red lights is one of the riskiest things you can do in a car.

The people who think it’s a joke are the people who actually understand the technology. Tesla is never winning this and the current pilots exist solely to pump the stock to gullible investors.

> Elon said in 2019 that there will be million robotaxis deployed in 2020. No, he didn't. He said there would be a million robotaxi-capable cars out there, i.e. Teslas with FSD-hardware sold. That milestone was missed by ~3 months.

Now do the areas where they don’t have a safety monitor in the car.

It’s a guy picking you up in a Tesla with FSD turned on. Eventually it will be fully autonomous but it’s a level below Waymo right now.

I took a few Waymos in San Fran. It was fine two of the three times, but the other time it was trying to make an illegal left turn from the middle lane. The road it was trying to turn onto was extremely busy and it just sat there for like eight lights, blocking traffic. I exited the vehicle right there and got a Lyft for the rest of the way. A human driver would have just gone straight and turned at the next light. It was not busy ahead.

If a person has to be there in case the self-driving messes up, it’s not (currently) autonomous, by definition since there‘s a human in the loop overseeing things.

So is Waymo not autonomous then? They have people ready remotely to take over and stop the car when it makes a mistake. What about if you’re shooting a gun, and have a supervisor there. Are you not shooting the gun then?

I would argue that Waymo is not fully autonomous, but it is more so than Tesla because there can be a significant delay between the vehicle “calling for help” and someone dealing with it. So the remote assistance person is not there to react to immediate tactical issues (how do I avoid hitting this vehicle) but rather strategic ones (how should I navigate this weird intersection due to construction). In the case of the Tesla, there is someone constantly supervising, making sure it doesn’t screw up the tactical issues. Here in Canada in order for someone without a firearms license to fire a gun, they must be under the “direct and immediate” supervision of someone with a firearms license (who is then responsible for ensuring they use the firearm safely).

Since you're comparing apples-to-oranges, you might as well compare Waymo to Uber's service area or McDonalds (for that matter). Waymo is doing something completely different than all of the above (including Robotaxi) -- so not sure they're worth comparing.

I agree with this comparison, but Teslas electric cars are the blackberry, and its market share is shrinking.

So what's the iPhone? Waymo? Maybe for robotaxi, but you can't buy one to own, and they will need to do something massively structural to beat Tesla on the cost to produce a vehicle (major input to cost per mile)?

Except I can actually get a ride in a Waymo. Every time I've requested a Robotaxi there have been none available.