Overview
- Obi analyzed 94,348 simulated ride requests from November 27 to January 1 and found Tesla offered the lowest prices, averaging $8.17 per ride in San Francisco and $1.99 per kilometer, with fares rarely exceeding $10.
- Tesla posted the slowest pickups with an average ETA of 15.32 minutes, compared with 5.74 minutes for Waymo, 5.14 for Lyft, and 3.15 for Uber.
- Waymo’s price gap versus human-driven services has narrowed to about 13% over Uber and 27% over Lyft on average, with near parity on longer trips; its average ride during the period was $19.69.
- Waymo reports operating roughly 2,000–2,500 vehicles across five U.S. cities and about 450,000 paid trips per week as of December, while Tesla’s Bay Area service relies on a small fleet with safety monitors and lacks California driverless permits.
- Consumer comfort with robotaxis rose to 63% in Obi’s survey, yet cost and wait times remain leading concerns as competition widens with Zoox’s free San Francisco service and Uber/Lucid testing.