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Whether you reckon self-driving cars are the peak of modernity or a harbinger of a sinister robotic future, there’s one thing we know about them for sure: they’re arriving in London very, very soon.
It’s now been revealed which London boroughs will have driverless cars on its streets in 2026, as the first photos of Waymo’s self-driving Jaguar I-Pace vehicles in the capital have just dropped.
Waymo, which operates under Google’s parent firm Alphabet Inc, is currently trialling its vehicles in the Big Smoke before they take their first passengers in the new year. The company posted an image on social media showing one of its self-driving Jaguar I-Pace cars on the Abbey Road zebra crossing.
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According to the company’s website, Waymo Drivers ‘never get drunk, tired, or distracted’. The vehicles employ a mix of cameras, radar sensors, and lidar sensors – a 3D scanning system – within its autonomous fleet. This enables the cars to detect overlapping fields of vision in every direction up to 500 metres away, the company claims. The vehicles are intended to operate without any driver, but currently human ‘safety drivers’ remain behind the wheel as the cars are tested in London.
Waymo currently operates in the US and has done since 2020. It’s available in cities including San Francisco, Los Angeles and Phoenix.
In a statement, Waymo said: ‘We will soon begin conducting extensive trials of Waymo’s technology as part of our mapping and safety validation work across select boroughs in London.’
It added: ‘We are not yet offering commercial rides, but our testing hours typically run 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to ensure our technology can safely handle all of London’s road conditions.’
Waymo didn’t confirm exactly when its driverless cars would be available to hail in the capital, but it did share a full list of London boroughs to receive the vehicles.
Every London borough that will get Waymo driverless cars in 2026
- Barking and Dagenham
- Brent
- Camden
- Ealing
- Royal Borough of Greenwich
- Hackney
- Hammersmith and Fulham
- Haringey
- Islington
- Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea
- Lambeth
- Lewisham
- Newham
- Redbridge
- Southwark
- Tower Hamlets
- Waltham Forest
- Wandsworth
- City of Westminster
- City of London
Uber is launching driverless cars in London next year.
And flying taxis will start operating in London by 2028, apparently.
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