Waymo’s rapid rise in ridership captured in a single chart

Waymo is now delivering around 500,000 paid robotaxi rides every week across 10 cities in the United States, according to a recent update the company shared on X. This figure highlights the rapid commercial expansion of the Alphabet-owned autonomous driving unit. Still, the pace of its growth tells an even more striking story.

In under two years, Waymo’s weekly paid trips have increased tenfold, rising from approximately 50,000 rides per week in May 2024 to 500,000 per week today. During that same period, the company has not only expanded within its original markets — Phoenix, San Francisco, and Los Angeles — but also entered several new cities. These include Austin, Atlanta, Miami, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and Orlando, with all seven of these Sun Belt markets added within just the past year.

While Waymo has been more reserved about sharing fleet data, some figures have surfaced. Information submitted to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in December 2025 indicated that the company operated 3,067 robotaxis equipped with its fifth-generation autonomous driving system. Waymo continues to refer to its fleet as “over 3,000” vehicles, although that number may soon change with the rollout of its sixth-generation system.

The upcoming system will debut on new vehicle platforms, including the Zeekr minivan, known as Ojai, and the Hyundai Ioniq 5. These additions are expected to enhance the company’s capabilities further and potentially increase deployment scale.

Despite the relatively stable fleet size, the sharp rise in weekly trips suggests that Waymo is improving utilisation across its vehicles. This metric is particularly critical, as idle autonomous vehicles circulating without passengers not only fail to generate revenue but can also contribute to urban congestion.

However, this rapid expansion has not been without complications. Waymo has faced growing scrutiny from both regulators and the public. Investigations are currently underway by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board into incidents involving robotaxis improperly interacting with school buses. Additionally, officials in San Francisco have raised concerns about how the company handles stalled vehicles, including instances in which emergency responders have had to intervene.

Even with its growth, Waymo’s scale remains small compared to traditional ride-hailing giants. Uber reported completing approximately 13.5 billion trips in 2025, a figure that includes both ride-hailing and delivery services. A more direct comparison comes from Uber’s August 2024 earnings call, in which it disclosed that its platform handled over 1 million mobility trips per hour.

This comparison underscores that Waymo is still far from matching the volume of established ride-hailing services. Nevertheless, the company’s lead in fully autonomous ride-hailing continues to widen. Several competitors are attempting to enter or expand within the robotaxi market, though many have yet to launch fully autonomous, paid services at scale.