GoKawiilSelf-driving company Zoox is expanding its existing service areas and bringing its robotaxis to two new cities.
The company on Tuesday said it's stretching its autonomous ride-hailing service into more parts of Las Vegas and San Francisco. In Vegas, it's more than doubling the number of locations where people can hop in a Zoox robotaxi, adding venues like the Las Vegas Convention Center and most major hotels along the Strip. Anyone can ride in Las Vegas by downloading the Zoox app and being at a designated pickup point. The company is also slowly rolling out service to high-traffic venues like the Sphere and T-Mobile Arena, first to Zoox employees and eventually to the public, later this spring.
In San Francisco, Zoox is quadrupling its service area to extend into the eastern half of the city, including the Marina, North Beach and Chinatown. It'll also operate in Pacific Heights and along the Embarcadero. Currently, only select early riders can hop aboard a Zoox robotaxi in San Francisco, but the company says it's opening up to more riders on its waitlist. You can join by downloading the Zoox app from the App Store or Google Play.
Watch this: This Robotaxi Looks and Drives Like No Car You've Ever Seen Before 11:09
Since mid-2024, Zoox has been testing its self-driving technology in Miami and Austin, Texas, using its retrofitted Toyota Highlander fleet. Now, it's gearing up to deploy its robotaxis in those cities as well. It'll first roll out its vehicles "within a small area of both cities," the company said in a blog post. Rides will initially be available only for Zoox employees, their family members and friends. Zoox will expand the operating areas as testing progresses and eventually open up to early riders from the general public.
Zoox robotaxis have a carriage-style interior with two rows facing each other. There's no driver's seat or steering wheel. Zoox
Zoox, owned by Amazon, says its robotaxis have driven nearly 2 million autonomous miles and transported over 350,000 riders to date. Trips are still free as the company scales and awaits regulatory approval to charge riders.
Zoox operates in many of the same cities as Alphabet-owned Waymo, which says it's driven 170 million autonomous miles through December 2025. Unlike Waymo's retrofitted fleet of Jaguar I-Pace vehicles, Zoox operates "purpose-built robotaxis" without a driver's seat, steering wheel or pedals. Instead, the interior has a carriage-like design, with two rows of riders facing each other, seating a total of four people. The boxy vehicles are also bidirectional, so they can operate while going in either direction.
Earlier this month, Zoox expanded operations into Phoenix and Dallas, where its test fleet will first manually map the areas before starting autonomous testing. Zoox also operates in Seattle, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Washington, DC.
Like its AV competitors, Zoox is teaming up with traditional ride-hailing service Uber to make rides available through that app as well. Customers in Las Vegas will be able to hail a Zoox vehicle via the Uber app starting this summer, and LA riders will be able to do the same next year. Uber now has more than two dozen AV partners, including Waymo, Nuro and May Mobility. Making robotaxis available through an app people already have on their phones could make it easier for first-time riders to consider climbing aboard a self-driving vehicle.