![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/SUT-L-WAYMO-SERVICE-AREA-01.jpeg\")
The initial Waymo service area includes 40 square miles of central San Diego. (Waymo)<\/p>\n
Waymo announced it would begin full service just days after the company told the U-T that it didn\u2019t have a concrete start date. \u201cExpansion will be gradual and guided by our safety framework,\u201d Waymo posted on X.<\/a><\/p>\n But on the same day Zoox announced that it would start testing in San Diego, Waymo decided to press the pedal on full deployment.<\/p>\n Currently, Waymo is the undisputed leader in the robotaxi space. It serves passengers in over a dozen cities, including new deployments in San Diego, Tampa, Florida, and Denver. Waymo is also testing in 18 other cities, including Tokyo and London.<\/p>\n But the Alphabet-owned company has competition.<\/p>\n Tuesday, Amazon\u2019s Zoox cabs shared ambitious plans with the U-T to deploy cars without steering wheels on San Diego roads.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not a car,\u201d the company reminds users on its website.<\/p>\n The beetle-esque vehicle \u2014 with big wheels and antenna-like cameras \u2014 has a carriage-style interior with two benches that face each other. Zoox vehicles are \u201cdesigned for riders, not drivers,\u201d the company says.<\/p>\n But you won\u2019t see the Zoox fleet crawling San Diego streets just yet.<\/p>\n First, Zoox\u2019s test vehicles \u2014 retrofitted Toyota Highlanders equipped with cameras, lidar and radar \u2014 will begin mapping and data collection across downtown, central tourist areas, and select residential neighborhoods.<\/p>\n In the test fleet, human drivers will begin mapping Little Italy, the Gaslamp Quarter, Old Town, University Heights, Mission Valley, and Balboa, North Park and South Park neighborhoods, the company said.<\/p>\n Waymo in San Diego: Rules, cost and what it\u2019s like inside a robotaxi<\/a><\/p>\n Founded in 2014, Zoox currently serves passengers in San Francisco and Las Vegas.<\/a> But it took the company a long time to start full service \u2014 seven years, to be exact.<\/p>\n In 2019<\/a>, Zoox began testing its vehicles in Vegas, but it didn\u2019t begin full service until this month.<\/a><\/p>\n Now, the company is launching testing operations in Houston, Texas and San Diego. It didn\u2019t share a timeline on when Zoox would begin picking up passengers, but the company did say that it\u2019s testing its fleet in a handful of other cities, including Seattle, Austin, Miami, Atlanta, Los Angeles and Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n \u201cSan Diego has a concentrated coastal corridor with heavy highway reliance, providing us with key experience ahead of future freeway operations. Its thick marine fog layer also offers essential real-world perception validation for our sensor suite,\u201d the company said in a statement to the U-T.<\/p>\n Tesla is also vying for space in the San Diego robotaxi scene.<\/p>\n Glimpses of gold-colored Tesla Cybercabs<\/a> tooling around city streets in recent days have raised questions about whether the electric vehicle company is looking to expand its autonomous robotaxi service into San Diego.<\/p>\n Tesla officials have not responded to multiple emails from the Union-Tribune about any plans to start testing, mapping and gathering data for potential business in the city, nor did the company make comments about multiple reported sightings of the distinctive-looking vehicles spotted in neighborhoods such as East Village, Pacific Beach, Sorrento Valley and around San Diego International Airport.<\/p>\n Tesla rarely posts press releases. Instead Tesla posts emojis to signal company news<\/a>. On Friday, the company hinted at an official deployment in Austin, Texas,<\/a> by reposting a video of a Cybercab on X with the comment \u201cLess than a week away.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n As for Tesla\u2019s California plans \u2014 it\u2019s still early days.<\/p>\n Testing and deployment of autonomous vehicles are regulated by state agencies:<\/p>\n The California Department of Motor Vehicles issues testing and deployment permits, sets rules for vehicle equipment and tracks collisions and traffic safety.<\/p>\n The California Public Utilities Commission licenses companies that use autonomous vehicles to transport members of the public and oversees robotaxi pilot programs.<\/p>\n Just a few weeks ago, the commission approved Waymo\u2019s expansion permit, allowing the company to pick up passengers in San Diego. As for Zoox and Tesla \u2014 they were granted permission from the CPUC and DMV to test their fleets with a human behind the wheel.<\/p>\n The pending entry of these companies deploying autonomous vehicles in and around San Diego has encountered resistance<\/a> in some quarters.<\/p>\n The Metropolitan Transit System\u2019s board of directors in January voted 12-1 to approve a resolution<\/a> opposing the expansion of Waymo robotaxis, citing concerns over potential job losses<\/a> for cab drivers, safety issues, and robotaxis possibly blocking first responders.<\/p>\n \u201cAutonomous vehicles don\u2019t just change how people move. They literally replace people,\u201d San Diego City Councilmember Sean Elo-Rivera<\/a> said at the time. Elo-Rivera is also chair of the Taxi Advisory Committee.<\/a><\/p>\n The transit system\u2019s CEO, Sharon Cooney<\/a>, has raised a host of economic and safety concerns. Citing a December 2025 power outage in San Francisco that resulted in driverless Waymo vehicles blocking intersections,<\/a> Cooney expressed concerns about autonomous vehicles blocking streets or trolley tracks and disrupting transit service if a similar event happened in San Diego.<\/p>\n But local jurisdictions do not have a say in how and when autonomous ride-hailing services roll out in California.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The race to get robotaxis on San Diego roads is ramping up. Waymo announced that it will start…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":450088,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[387,181,23,100,74,76,75,1970,1696,1967],"class_list":["post-450087","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-business","tag-latest-headlines","tag-local-news","tag-news","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news","tag-technology","tag-top-stories-sdut","tag-transportation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450087","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=450087"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450087\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/450088"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=450087"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=450087"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=450087"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"San](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/sut-l-waymo-012.jpg\")
Waymo said it will start serving customers in San Diego on Tuesday. (Kristian Carreon \/ The San Diego Union-Tribune)<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Tesla_Texas_41995.jpg\")
Tesla’s Cybercabs, like this one shown in Austin, Texas, have no rearview mirrors or steering wheel, though the vehicles spotted in San Diego have a human in the driver’s seat. (Jay Janner\/Austin American-Statesman via AP)<\/p>\n