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Miami has officially entered its driverless era.
After more than a year of quietly testing autonomous taxis on local streets, Waymo has flipped the switch on public service across much of the city, launching its self-driving ride-hailing fleet in a 60-square-mile service area that covers big chunks of Miami, plus Coral Gables and South Miami.
Riders book trips through the Waymo app, much like any other ride-share, except the vehicle that pulls up is fully autonomous. The initial coverage zone stretches from Coconut Grove through Brickell, Wynwood, the Design District and West Miami, with airport runs to Miami International coming soon. According to Waymo, nearly 10,000 residents have already signed up to try the service, with new riders being invited in phases to keep things running smoothly.
Miami now joins San Francisco, Phoenix, Los Angeles and parts of Austin on Waymo’s growing map—part of an aggressive national expansion as autonomous vehicle companies race to scale up ahead of competitors like Tesla. Waymo, which is owned by Google’s parent company Alphabet, has positioned itself as the most established player in the space, with more than 127 million miles driven in fully autonomous mode.
The company emphasizes the safety of its rides. Waymo says its vehicles, which are guided by artificial intelligence, lidar, radar and cameras, have logged significantly fewer serious injury crashes than human drivers across its operating markets. Critics, however, argue that those claims are difficult to independently verify and that true statistical certainty would require billions of miles, not millions. Concerns have also been fueled by high-profile hiccups elsewhere, including a December incident in San Francisco where hundreds of Waymo cars stalled simultaneously during a power outage.
Miami has already had its own viral moment: earlier this month, a video circulated showing a Waymo vehicle stopped on the Venetian Causeway between Miami and Miami Beach. Waymo said the issue was addressed, noting that unpredictable traffic scenarios remain a core challenge for autonomous systems.
Still, local officials have welcomed the launch, calling it a part of Miami’s transportation future that could ultimately offer new mobility options for residents, visitors and people with disabilities. For now, the cars are rolling, the app is live and Miami’s famously chaotic streets just became a real-world testing ground for what might be the country's most high-tech commute.
Whether it feels thrilling, unsettling or a little bit of both depends on the rider, but either way, the future just pulled up to the curb.