- Tesla unveiled its “public oriented” Robotaxi service this weekend
- Service is currently an invitation case only
- Reports suggest that he is still behind Waymo and other rivals
In a turn of surprising events, Tesla respected its recent deadlines and really launched an autonomous autonomous service “public oriented” in Austin, Texas, this weekend.
Although the legislators of Texas asked Musk to postpone the procedure until he has finalized and introduces new laws surrounding fully autonomous taxis, the controversial CEO has nevertheless plowed.
Consequently, the reports surface on various social media networks which show the first VIP guests taking advantage of their first Robotaxi experience.
However, it is far from the script of futuristic Cybercab that Tesla presented during her Hollywood event “ `us, robot ” in October of last year, where tailor -made cybercabs transported ferrers, only for the world to discover that they were really operated by television.
This is a similar story with the recent Robotaxi company in Tesla, because the “fleet” of 10-20 Model Y vehicles (sporting a brand of Robotaxi) is strictly limited to a relatively simple area of Austin, Texas.
They also only work between 6 a.m. and 12 p.m. and have a remote operator in the passenger seat to manually check the identification of cyclists and take control if a problem arises.
The penis has reported that some of Tesla’s driverless vehicles are also followed by “chase” vehicles, probably filled with engineers ready to jump if there is a problem that operators by car and distant cannot manage.
Until now, only a selected number of invitations has gone to influencers mainly “pro-Tesla”, according to The Verge, with the initial list of test pilots reading like a Who’s-WHO of the Sycophant Musk-Merritt of Tesla Sawyer Sawyer de Tesla.
Like the “ “ event, robot ”, this initial launch phase is very similar to a massive public relations cascade, the company essentially inviting the “general public” (read the creators of Tesla content) for a journey during the very early test phase, rather than during the widespread deployment of a legitimate and paid service.
Why Waymo is well in advance
It is impossible to talk about the Tesla Robotaxi service without mentioning its closest competitor Waymo, especially when Musk would have declared after this successful initial launch phase that it could up to a thousand robotaxis on the road in a few months.
As a reminder, Waymo currently has a fully operational fleet of 1,500 vehicles on the road in four major cities in the United States, with the areas in which it constantly operates inside these cities. Anyone can invoke a driver -free cabin with a simple application interface and he will not see a human inside the vehicle.
At the end of 2026, he hoped to have added 2,000 other vehicles according to a blog article from the company belonging to Alphabet published in May of this year, while it continues to prepare a fleet of Jaguar I-Pace cars for autonomous driving.
Waymo also announced that it will be the first major customer of Robotaxi Ioniq 5 produced by Hyundai, which will help him even faster.
To think that Musk will be able to reach this step a few months after what is essentially an initial test phase is a pure fantasy, especially since it insists on the use of a complete autonomous driving system only which does not have the radars, the Lidar and the myriad of other sensors which, according to its rivals, are compulsory for a reliable and safe service.
Scaling is the real test
Already, a certain number of videos have already surfaced on Reddit which seem to show Tesla Robotaxis behaving irregularly, by causing it at the intersections occupied and slamming on the brakes for the parked police cars which are not even arrested on the road.
Admittedly, it is impossible to check the authenticity of a Reddit video, but there is a growing list of very public cases where the Tesla total autonomous system was active during an accident.
The first criticisms of experience seem largely positive, most cyclists describing the reader as “smooth” or “similar to man”, but it is still very early.
![First Tesla Robotaxi stroll [Full Drive] - YouTube](https://pkpressclub.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/1750706849_494_I-do-not-buy-Tesla-Robotaxi-media-here-is.jpg)
To watch
Things will become much more complicated if and when Tesla has legitimately thousands of vehicles on the road, he removes the operator seated on the passenger seat, and he builds his application so that the general public can really use it. I predict that it is at least two years.
In addition to Waymo, there are companies in China which also take place with fully autonomous active services. Baidu, Weride and Pony.a already accumulate hundreds and thousands of kilometers.
Last year, Baidu would have aroused anxiety among taxi drivers, automotive brands and the audience active after launching a driver -free service in Wuhan which offered walks of around six miles (much further than the four miles reported that Tesla can currently travel) for around 50 cents.
He underestimated trips with a human driver behind the wheel of about two dollars and naturally turned out to be very popular, according to CNN, leading to panic that many jobs could soon be at risk.
Once the legal framework in place for the general deployment of autonomous vehicles, it would not be too stretched to think that the Chinese could dive and dominate the market … Just as they did with electric vehicles.
