Waymo Robotaxis Open to All in San Antonio, San Diego, Tampa

The waitlists are gone

On October 14, Waymo opened its fully driverless ride-hailing service to the general public in San Antonio, San Diego and Tampa on the same day. That ended the invitation-only phase that had limited access in all three markets.1 San Antonio also gets fully autonomous pickups at San Antonio International Airport, which makes this more than a change to who is allowed to book.1 A day later, Waymo started serving Nashville International Airport with a limited group of riders. BNA is the company's fifth airport, after Phoenix Sky Harbor, San José Mineta, San Francisco International and San Antonio.10

The three cities reached this point on different schedules. San Antonio took its first public riders on February 24, as part of a four-city launch. San Diego and Tampa began service on September 1.1 Waymo says hundreds of thousands of people rode in the three cities during the staggered rollout.1

The coverage does not fully agree on which cities were included. One outlet listed Denver, San Diego and Tampa as the cities opening to the public this week. Its own summary of the same story named San Antonio instead of Denver.6 The most detailed launch-day account names San Antonio, San Diego and Tampa, and it ties the airport service to San Antonio.1 That is the more reliable version. Denver, which launched alongside San Diego and Tampa on September 1, appears to still be letting riders in gradually.7 Another city guide gave July as the launch month for San Diego, Tampa and Denver.9 July is when Waymo announced those markets, not when paid service began. Paid, fully driverless rides started on September 1.7

A company that now grows several cities at a time

The bigger story is how fast Waymo is now expanding. Its footprint went from three U.S. cities in 2024 to 15 this fall. The company now gives about 500,000 paid rides a week.5 Trackers estimate the fleet at roughly 4,000 vehicles covering about 4 million autonomous miles a week.7 In September, the company described the next step as a list of 15 metros: Phoenix, the Bay Area, Los Angeles, San Diego, Denver, Las Vegas, Atlanta, Austin, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, Orlando, Tampa, Miami and Nashville.7

Much of that growth comes from hardware. Waymo's Texas fleet grew almost 50 percent in three weeks, reaching 1,102 vehicles by September 24, mostly because of the new Ojai minivan.5 Research firm MoffettNathanson, which follows Ojai shipping records, expects Waymo to import about 5,100 of the vehicles by the end of the year. Florida and newer markets such as Las Vegas are likely to get a large share.2 California and Texas still account for about 80 percent of the fleet.5 Waymo has also raised a $5 billion loan from Blackstone and PIMCO to pay for more expansion.6

Launch reporting shows a repeatable sequence in every new city. Waymo spends months validating on local streets and coordinating with first responders. Then it invites riders, invites more of them, and finally opens to everyone.1 Commentators who see this as a sign of maturity have a reasonable case. One tech outlet noted that announcing several cities at once breaks from Waymo's old habit of launching one city at a time.3 Opening three markets in one day pushes that further.

Waymo continues to present its safety record as the basis for expanding. In February, the company said it had driven more than 200 million fully autonomous miles. It also said data from more than 127 million of those miles showed far fewer serious-injury and pedestrian-injury crashes than human-driver benchmarks.1 An Insurance Institute for Highway Safety study published in July also found Waymo vehicles had a lower crash involvement rate than cars driven by people.15 There are counterweights, though. NHTSA has logged 2,308 crashes involving Waymo vehicles since July 2021. In January 2026, federal investigators opened inquiries into robotaxis illegally passing stopped school buses and into a crash in which a vehicle hit a child in a school zone.12 San Antonio's service was paused after severe flooding in April. It resumed on September 17, after software changes to detect standing water and new limits keeping cars out of high-risk flood areas.19

Regulation: state permits and local pushback

The biggest tension in this expansion is about who gets to approve it. In California, the decision belongs to the state. On August 14, regulators approved Waymo's largest expansion so far, opening 18 counties to rides with no driver. The permit covers freeways, rural roads and night driving in rain and fog.6 Paid service now covers a large area across several counties rather than a single test zone.

The state's decision did not settle the issue in San Diego. On September 14, two weeks after the California Public Utilities Commission let Waymo begin service there, the city council voted 8-0 for a resolution seeking local control over autonomous vehicles.11 Council members raised concerns about emergency response and about taxi drivers losing work at the airport. They added amendments on empty cars circling, on how vehicles stop safely during power outages or cyberattacks, on pickups in bike lanes, and on disability compliance.11 Waymo's state and local policy manager called the resolution "extraordinarily premature." He pointed to more than 100,000 San Diegans on the waitlist and a 94 percent reduction in serious-injury crashes in the company's data.11 Waymo opened to everyone in San Diego one month after that vote. The company is clearly not waiting for cities to win any authority.

The Upper Midwest is moving in a different direction. Minneapolis would require a paid, licensed human monitor in the driver's seat of every autonomous vehicle, along with a city operating license.13 Waymo has called that framework a "de facto ban."15 Seven of the 13 council members voted for it. Mayor Jacob Frey vetoed it, and an override vote was scheduled for October 15.14 Minnesota has no autonomous-vehicle law. A state senator drafting legislation argues that driving laws requiring a licensed driver mean the cars cannot legally operate at all.13 St. Paul took a slower route and told its planning commission to study protections for safety, data sharing and workers before Waymo arrives.14

Portland is writing rules before it has any service. City transportation staff have proposed allowing at most 225 autonomous vehicles a year, all of them electric.16 Companies would also have to drive 50,000 local miles before charging fares, use remote operators licensed in the U.S., and pay a fee to support rideshare drivers who lose work.17 A Portland official said none of the cities where Waymo already operates have written their own rules.16 Oregon's state bill to allow fully automated cars died in committee this year after opposition from the Drivers Union and local governments.18

Washington is moving toward national standards

At the federal level, policy is moving toward national rules. In February, Waymo asked the Senate Commerce Committee for uniform nationwide standards and warned that heavy regulation could hand the global autonomous-vehicle market to Chinese companies.12 The SELF DRIVE Act of 2026 cleared a subcommittee on a 12-11 vote but has not become law.19 Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has told NHTSA to speed up work on the first national performance standards for autonomous vehicles.19

Federal regulators are also watching how the cars behave around emergencies. In July, NHTSA ordered developers to submit plans for fixing robotaxi interference at active emergency scenes. That order was widely seen as aimed at Waymo. The deadline has passed, and NHTSA has not announced any outcome.19 California has passed a law that lets the state fine robotaxi companies for getting in the way of emergency services.12 A House bill that would let officials geofence autonomous vehicles during emergencies has not moved since it was sent to committee.19

Analysis: more permission, less local control

The pattern across this coverage is that Waymo is winning approval at the levels of government that matter most for scale, mainly state regulators and federal agencies that lean toward uniform rules. Most of the resistance comes from city councils, which often lack the power to stop it. San Diego shows this clearly. The council objected unanimously, and the service still opened to everyone a month later.111 Where states have not acted, as in Minnesota and Oregon, cities have real leverage. Those are the places where Waymo is still mapping streets rather than carrying paying riders.1318

For now, the people Waymo brought forward on launch day were seniors' advocates and blind riders, people who describe the service as giving them independence.1 Rideshare drivers, many of them immigrants, are making the counterargument in council meetings.14 The October 14 opening shows Waymo can operate at scale. Whether cities will be allowed to set their own terms for it is still undecided.