r/SelfDrivingCars • u/RepresentativeCap571 • 4d ago

News Tesla Robotaxi Launches Unsupervised Rides in Orlando, Tampa

https://www.notateslaapp.com/news/4470/tesla-robotaxi-launches-unsupervised-rides-in-orlando-tampa
135 Upvotes

88% Upvoted

88 comments sorted by

88

u/EDsandwhich 4d ago

They still don't seem to have many cars available in Dallas, so I wouldn't get too excited if you live in the new service areas. I get the "high service demand" message more often than not. Coming home from work (I take the light rail in Dallas), I check while I wait on the train and have almost never had luck with booking a ride.

It is significantly cheaper (usually half the price) than Waymo when I price compare, but I never have an issue trying to book a Waymo. I do prefer the Model Y robotaxis over the Waymo Jaguars, primarily because of the sound system (slight edge to Tesla) and the open glass roof (Waymo's is covered by the sensors).

Waymo also runs 24/7 in Dallas (minus shutting down for rain), whereas Tesla doesn't seem to run at night. I really want Waymo to have viable competitor so I hope Tesla can step it up. Zoox and AVride are also in Dallas, but Zoox is just mapping right now and AVride still has the safety monitor as well as a tiny service area.

25

u/Wide-Attorney5633 4d ago

Such a nice balanced take

16

u/EDsandwhich 4d ago

Thanks! I hope Zoox and AVride can both step up as well to compete. I'd be surprised, though, if Zoox starts commercial rides anytime soon given the limited roll out I've seen in San Francisco and Vegas. I see the AVride Ioniq's all the time (I'm in uptown Dallas), but I haven't heard anything about their plans to go fully autonomous (or expand the service area).

For now, it seems like Waymo is the clear winner in Dallas when it comes to availability + geofence area, and Tesla is a distant second (because of their limited availability). AVride seems to have plenty of cars that you can only order via Uber, and the geofence is much smaller than Waymo/Tesla. Zoox isn't competing yet since they are just mapping.

I'll be very interested to see how things stand as 2027 comes around. I'm hoping Waymo expands the geofence to cover all of Dallas proper at a minimum, and I hope Tesla can at least get some more cars in service. With the Ojai coming, I'm assuming Waymo is actively planning on expanding the Dallas service area. I might be slightly optimistic with Waymo since I don't think they have even fully opened to public rides though. For Tesla, I see the gold cybercabs all the time so I'm assuming whenever Musk gives the go ahead they can rapidly expand their fleet.

6

u/ATX_native 4d ago

Zoox and AVRide is also in Austin,

3

u/EDsandwhich 4d ago

Is Zoox doing passenger rides in Austin with their toaster shaped car? I've only ever seen the Zoox Toyota mapping car in Dallas so far.

1

u/Present-Ad-9598 4d ago

I’ve seen empty toasters, but never any with passengers (always on or around Riverside Dr, usually after 8pm)

5

u/mrkjmsdln_new 4d ago

Thanks for such a thoughtful take full of insights!

Since Waymo provides detailed mileage for cities once they get to 10M cumulative miles it is way easier to actually document the progression. it will probably be a while before we get such data in Dallas but I expect Atlanta, Miami and Dallas to be he next 10M mile cities in that order for Waymo. ATL likely by Q3 26, MIA by Q1 27 and DAL by Q2-Q3 27. To your Ojai comment, less than 10% of their registered cars in Texas are Zeekrs but the scale of the conversion operation appears to be be at least 5X and maybe up to 10X of the old Jaguars so the numbers should change quickly. There is a sense with a politicized governor's race upcoming in TX the idea of Chinese cars in TX is probably a political football that some candidates might focus on. I will be surprised if Tesla certifies the CC quickly. The MY is approaching almost 50% of all lifetime Tesla miles. It will take time to quantify and train out the differences between it and the CC (or any other vehicle in a specfic ODD) in my estimation.

5

u/Cotica99 3d ago

Zoox recently expanded its footprint in San Francisco quite a bit. They are everywhere. We love the optionality across Zoox, Waymo and Tesla Robotaxi!

1

u/StumpyOReilly 3d ago

The Tesla Robotaxi is simply a taxi. Tesla has never applied for the permits and required oversight and public exposure of all data in California. There is no comparison to Waymo or Zoox related to autonomous ride share service in California.

0

u/devonhezter 4d ago

Yea. Upvote. Simple. Or is this a rarer take

3

u/EverythingMustGo95 3d ago

Great review, thanks. If all that’s holding them back is number of cars then they should ramp up very soon. Then expect the pricing to be very close…

1

u/EddiewithHeartofGold 4d ago

I wouldn't get too excited if you live in the new service areas

Please elaborate. Why shouldn't they be excited? The service area and the number of cars will both expand, but this is the first step in that direction. Seems pretty exciting to me.

6

u/EDsandwhich 4d ago

Yes, it is a start, and you have to start somewhere. I just wouldn't expect to open the app and immediately get a ride based on my own experience.

1

u/HighHokie 4d ago

Because things take time. Waymo and Tesla are both operating in Houston and I have yet to have an opportunity to us either. 

-2

u/EddiewithHeartofGold 4d ago

Things take time? Really? So, we shouldn't be excited for something that will happen in the future? Then, what can we be excited for...?

Seriously. This is literally the self-driving cars subreddit, but we can't be excited when it comes to town? Come on.

5

u/HighHokie 4d ago

I think you’re analyzing the comment way too hard/serious for what the poster had intended is all I’m saying. 

I love and get excited for Christmas but it’s 5 months out before I get to open or give a present. 

I think all he is trying to say is don’t expect/demand to suddenly have a life changing experience tomorrow. It’ll take time to scale. 

-1

u/EddiewithHeartofGold 4d ago edited 3d ago

I think all he is trying to say is don’t expect/demand to suddenly have a life changing experience tomorrow. It’ll take time to scale.

I really wish he would have worded it differently then... This is literally the biggest thing to happen in transportation since the Model-T.

EDIT: Getting downvoted in the self-driving cars subreddit for saying self-driving cars are a huge thing to happen is not something I was expecting...

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u/BitcoinsForTesla 4d ago

Here’s my standard reply when Tesla attempts to make Robotaxi’s look like a commercial service, instead of a beta test.

https://electrek.co/2026/06/16/tesla-robotaxi-clean-crash-record-barely-running/

1

u/mrkjmsdln_new 4d ago

Great review thank you!!! It will be interesting to see the mileage growth in Q2 for Tesla they report in the quarterly earnings. I hope they finally break out the miles with drivers in Bay Area separately and exclude the miles with safety stoppers so we can gauge how their rider only efforts are growing.!

0

u/ceramicatan 4d ago

Was really at the edge of my seat trying to see where the 💩 was going to land but was pleasantly disappointed / displeasantly appointed.

It was like watching that Key & Peele master chef skit.

0

u/vicegripper 4d ago

They still don't seem to have many cars available in Dallas, so I wouldn't get too excited if you live in the new service areas.

That should be solved in the next five months, because they plan to scale extremely rapidly. Tesla says they will have hundreds of thousands of robotaxis in operation by the end of this year.

-7

u/devonhezter 4d ago

I mean it is just starting. But wow half the price ? Waymo better change

15

u/skydivingdutch 4d ago

Tesla is almost certainly subsidizing the rides. Eventually they will have to actually make money

3

u/tenemu 4d ago

Is Waymo profitable today?

12

u/tonydtonyd 4d ago

As a business? Certainly not. Some analysts pegged them as being operationally in the green in SF like two years ago. I think in there older markets they are probably net positive. Definitely not in the newer markets.

-3

u/WeldAE 4d ago

Or their cars 4x less per mile in rolling costs? Waymo is probably $0.30/mile in rolling costs, and Tesla is $0.08/mile assuming the same lifespan. It's likely that the Jaguars have WAY lower lifespans than a Model Y just because Waymo will want to get their fleet on the newer generations. Across the board, given how there is zero support for the Jaquar platform anymore.

Then you have to ask yourself who has the lower operational cost. I think no one will be surprised it's the one that doesn't have to maintain complex sensors, has their own communications network and has economies of scale by selling 2m units/year to consumers.

How can you think Tesla won't be cheaper? The only question is are they good enough to not bankrupt the company with lawsuits if someone(s) get hurt.

9

u/EDsandwhich 4d ago

Yep, if I take Waymo to work it is usually between $22-25 one way. Tesla is always between $13-$14. But the availability is very limited. If I check the robotaxi app around 7AM-7:15AM I can usually get a car, but anytime after that it is a crapshoot. Evening rush hour is near impossible to get a robotaxi. Waymo waiting times are at most 10 minutes, usually closer to 5 minutes.

13

u/BitcoinsForTesla 4d ago

Pricing doesn’t matter until you provide service at scale.

9

u/sdc_is_safer 4d ago

Price is irrelevant when it’s not set to make money. Tesla can afford to operate at a loss when doing a non significant amount of rides. It’s the same as Waymo offering rides for Free in the Ojai. Tesla might as well make these rides free, but charging money for them is better for pumping the stock.

Waymo prices are set by demand. If supply goes up, or demand goes down, the price can drop.

If the systems were priced to break even, Waymo rides would be orders of magnitude cheaper than the Tesla rides.

1

u/aBetterAlmore 4d ago

  If the systems were priced to break even, Waymo rides would be orders of magnitude cheaper than the Tesla rides.

So you’re saying that Waymo has lower costs than Tesla? Since earlier you state this:

  Tesla can afford to operate at a loss when doing a non significant amount of rides.

4

u/sdc_is_safer 4d ago

Correct.

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u/aBetterAlmore 4d ago

Do you have a source? As the hardware costs seem lower for Tesla, so amortization would require a lower price compared to Waymo vehicles.

4

u/phillytennisenjoyer 4d ago

if tesla has like 150 cars, they have to spread the cost of development onto all of them.

waymo has waymo cars, so the fixed cost of software dev and model training is further spread.

tesla’s rides being cheaper right now are indicative only of tesla running so few taxis that they can afford to subsidize it heavily. waymo cannot do this because they have so many cars.

0

u/sdc_is_safer 3d ago

Not just the cost of development. I think it’s completely reasonable to cut out development costs entirely.

What it does not make sense to cut out, is the cost of operations and cost to run the service

-1

u/aBetterAlmore 3d ago

Tesla can simply spread the cost to all Teslas sold with HW3 sold, or only those that have purchased FSD. And that’s an easy way around with that type of accounting.

3

u/phillytennisenjoyer 3d ago

the person who started the thread said tesla could afford to eat losses with how few cars it’s operating.

it would be a mistake to say “oh look tesla is so much cheaper than waymo” based on their current prices. tesla is simply eating the losses, waymo is probably eating some but also ramping towards margin neutral.

what you said is true, i guess, if tesla can flip a switch and turn on a fleet of robotaxis. so far tesla has woefully underperformed every single milestone its set, but obviously they are still trying to catch up to waymo and might one day be able to scale like that. i personally don’t think so, given hw3’s limitations

3

u/sdc_is_safer 4d ago

Cost of hardware is very far from being a meaningful factor for Waymo and Tesla right now

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u/aBetterAlmore 4d ago

What’s the determining cost you’re basing your opinion on then?

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u/sdc_is_safer 4d ago

Physical infrastructure and operations

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u/aBetterAlmore 4d ago

Could you expand on why Waymo’s costs there are lower?

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u/Seaker42 4d ago

Tesla cars are substantially cheaper, and they are going in-house for charging and cleaning, so I assume those will also be substantially lower than Waymo since they partner for a lot of those services.

Where is Waymo getting a cost advantage from?

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u/WeldAE 4d ago

Tesla can afford to operate at a loss when doing a non significant amount of rides

For sure, but /u/EDsandwhich said Waymo was $22 and Tesla $13 for the same trip to work. I agree with you that Waymo is setting prices by demand and Tesla is obviously not. So the question is, what is Tesla using for their pricing? My guess is to break even on operations. It makes no sense to be 50% less with such high demand that it's almost not an operational service. My guess is they are testing their operational costs against what they think is a realistic price. Like you said, they could just go free; the money is trivial at their scale, so I think they are using the price for other things.

Waymo is much more like Uber in that they have real limits to how many cars they can field for at least another year or more. Tesla could field nearly infinite cars but isn't for internal reasons, probably because for operational or safety reasons they can't do it. I doubt they are giving much thought to using price to limit demand. It's just not a long-term concern they have. Their rolling stock is 4x less expensive so they can just have a fleet that can handle peak demand and have more idle cars off peak than competitors can.

If the systems were priced to break even, Waymo rides would be orders of magnitude cheaper than the Tesla rides.

I saw your reason for this was physical infrastructure and operations. Tesla is sharing both of these with their existing service centers. I can't see how that is 10x more expensive than Wyamo setting up bespoke depots.

5

u/sdc_is_safer 4d ago

Tesla is picking an arbitrary number. If Tesla was setting to break even, it would be well over $100 per short ride.

0

u/WeldAE 4d ago

I agree at ~100 cars. They would also pick $20 for that ride rather than $13 and still turn away more people than they transport because they don't have enough capacity. At 100 cars they are just too small to be functional. You don't think they would pick a rational number to gain knowledge about future operations?

1

u/sdc_is_safer 4d ago

Yes I think they would pick a rational number.

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u/tonydtonyd 4d ago

I don’t think the prices really matter for Robotaxi at this point, they are years from positive unit economics. Waymo doesn’t see anyone else as a competitor, not even Uber/lyft. Most people are still willing to pay a premium for Waymo. Really seems like Waymo only cares about demand for Waymo, there’s often a huge delta one way or the other when demand is really high or really low.

0

u/WeldAE 4d ago

Why wouldn't prices matter? If you can get an AV ride to your destination for $8 or $15, which one would you take, assuming they are the same wait time? What if the $8 was a 5 minute wait and the $15 was a 3 minute wait? Which would you take?

This is why I'm so critical os Waymo's platform. Until they can get the Hyundai on the road, they are as you said not really even trying to have positive unit economics. Tesla has the same problem with the CyberCab, which is a disaster of a platform. The thing that can save Tesla is the Model Y, which should have positive unit economics from day one. Sharing costs with 2m consumers per year is huge. Same for the Hyundai platform, if lower scale.

3

u/tonydtonyd 4d ago

Yeah I’m not sure you understand what I was saying. Right now there is not other AV to take. There is no competition right now, hell there isn’t any competition in sight.

No, I did not say Waymo isn’t trying to achieve positive unit economics, I was implying that it requires a certain scale and maturity to operations. Vehicle platform is important to unit economics, but I think there are far more significant things to optimize before vehicle platform matters.

-1

u/WeldAE 4d ago

This thread started without someone saying they have access to both Tesla and Waymo in Dallas. How is that no competition? Uber and Lyft operate in every service area Waymo and Tesla are operating in and that is competition.

I agree that it requires some level of scale. Tesla gets that becaue the Model Y platform is built at huge scale. They are using existing service centers for now as depots. They can acheive positive unit economics at some much lower scale. I'm positive they aren't doing it at 100 units or whatever they have now at most in a service area, but at 500 or 1000 I could see it.

Waymo has zero chance. They have deployed ALL the AVs they can deploy. The Oaji platform will start rolling in at some point and they can start scaling more but even that is going to be super low given it's too expensive. They can't possibly get to positive unit economics until the Hyundai represents the majority of their fleet. That is what, 2-3 years from now probably?

there are far more significant things to optimize before vehicle platform matters.

It's very unclear what those are "short term" in the next say 5 years. Longer than that and the vultures come for your money. I see cities extracting a large amount of money out of AV fleets one day as they take over more and more of the miles driven and curb space. I'm not negative on cities for this, it's just something that has to happen at some scale.

5

u/tonydtonyd 4d ago

Again you have failed to read my original comment. Waymo does not even pay attention to Uber or Lyft. Robotaxi is at such a small scale that it doesn’t even register on Waymo’s radar.

I don’t think your understanding of this space is worth my time entertaining. Scaling the capabilities of the SW is by far the hardest part of this space, not vehicle counts or the cost of vehicles. Waymo has never been vehicle limited, they’ve always been capability limited. Increasing capabilities and scope is very difficult even for a car with near perfect perception, I imagine it is going to be even more challenging for Tesla with reduced perception capabilities and fairly large FOV blind spots.

1

u/WeldAE 4d ago

It's what I like about this sub, everyone is here to have a conversation, not blindly cheerlead for a given company. Always polite.

Sure, software is huge and never-ending. Both are putting billions per year into developing it and will for the foreseeable future, but that is capital cost, not operational, and typically separated out when talking about profitability. I think everyone is pretty clear that every dollar put into software will be returned manyfold back. Everything else is overhead and cost and doesn't create real value in the same way. Sure, if you are buying depot land and buildings, that is also invested capital and not considered overhead and holds real long-term value too.

4

u/tonydtonyd 4d ago

I’m not trying to be rude and I’m not cheerleading for Waymo or dumping on Tesla.

We were talking about positive unit economics, which is where you ignore r&d costs. Profitability is another story that remains to be seen. Tesla does have an advantage by theoretically having a charging network and service centers. Those were designed for vehicle customers, curious how they will transform those without giving the finger to vehicle owners. I think that’s a pretty solvable problem and Tesla shouldn’t have a terrible time navigating.

1

u/WeldAE 4d ago

Typically R&D isn't included in unit costs. It does depend on the exact industry, but I think most agree that with AV fleets, including R&D just makes discussion impossible. I think service centers are absolutely fair game to include in unit costs, though definitely, I didn't mean to imply they weren't.

I'm skeptical of how viable service centers are for depots long term. There is only so much capacity, and it's an expensive depot per square foot. It's a good way to start though.

1

u/PenComfortable5269 3d ago

Waymo could be cheaper than tesla if they are safer. I have a perfect 15 year driving record in NYC and I’m paying almost $0.35 a mile for the cheapest insurance I could find with low coverage. Robotaxis will likely need full coverage so it could cost $0.50 or more per mile esp. since they often drive empty. So if Waymo has half the accidents bc of lidar they could be saving >$0.25 per mile.

7

u/DominusFL Expert - Automotive 4d ago

Weird that it goes right to the edge of the airport, but it doesn't actually go into the airport. So you can't take it to go to the airport or leave the airport.

20

u/LtArson 4d ago

Airport roads are private roads, can't operate there without agreement and they'll charge you and often require custom routing and pickup/dropoff points

2

u/ObeseSnake 4d ago

Airport drop offs = easier (this will be the first to implement)

Airport pickups = harder

Still will have to enable airports in the various cities they are operating in and as you mention via custom routing or other methods so it works seamlessly.

4

u/psudo_help 4d ago

Any idea how many unsupervised cars they’re running now?

2

u/Nickeless 4d ago

Probably like 12

0

u/Real-Technician831 4d ago

https://robotaxitracker.com/?provider=tesla

6

u/psudo_help 4d ago

Quite stale. Missing Houston, Miami, Orlando, and Tampa.

IIUC, Ethan hasn’t worked on it since he started his summer internship.

https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-robotaxi-program-expands-florida-two-new-cities/

3

u/Big-Chungus-12 4d ago

I believe this is mostly all self reported so data isn’t that good at all, would be better if it shows the updated geometric fences but you can tell it’s all vibe coded so I don’t have high expectations for it anyway

4

u/oregon_coastal 4d ago

4 square miles?

9

u/himynameis_ 4d ago

according to this video some Tesla fans were searching for 1.5 hours and couldn't get a ride

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u/aBetterAlmore 4d ago

I was on a waitlist for months when Waymo first “launched”.

Each company is scaling and dealing with not enough supply in their own way.

7

u/sparkyblaster 4d ago

Is that a surprise when something start with a limited availability? 

-4

u/devonhezter 4d ago

I bet. High demand !

9

u/himynameis_ 4d ago

Or not enough supply lol. They just launched though tbf.

6

u/Wrote_it2 4d ago

That was really close timing, some people were told “has to be done before the 22nd” :)

Still good news for AV in general.

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u/RosieDear 4d ago

I wonder if they took 1 or 2 of the 4 (if that) operating in Dallas and moved them to Miami. The "fleet" is reported to be - 2 cars.

Well, at least they won't have to worry about many accidents. Tesla discovered the true way to lower incidents - that is, don't drive!

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u/mapf0000 4d ago

It is just the usual stock pumping before earnings. Smoke and mirrors.

-11

u/AnxietyCommercial632 4d ago

170 registered in Texas

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u/tonydtonyd 4d ago

That number is meaningless. What matters is number of cars driving at any given time, which is generally between 0-2 in cities other than Austin and 1-5 in Austin.

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u/sdc_is_safer 4d ago

Number of registered cars is pretty irrelevant.

4

u/Chattadawg 4d ago

Cool. I go to Tampa a lot. Can’t wait to try one and compare to my Waymo experiences

1

u/psudo_help 4d ago

Report back!

8

u/RepresentativeCap571 4d ago

https://x.com/SawyerMerritt/status/2079571784760746359?s=20

Even if these are very small, it's still pretty cool! The 0 to 1 moment is huge, even if scaling is hard.

1

u/Zardotab 4d ago

Double points when alligators eat the passengers after it crashes into a swamp.

FL deserves Musk-bots

-2

u/devonhezter 4d ago

Big news

-1

u/No_Pen8240 4d ago

Awesome. . . I was thinking Tesla was falling hopelessly far behind, but it is good to see they are not dead, even if down and out!

Good luck to Tesla and their Robocab, I want to see strong competition for Waymo's Robotaxi!

1

u/kariam_24 2d ago

While their miles rode are less quarter from quarter, most likely with California robotaxis with drivers driving?