The price gap between Waymo and Uber is narrowing

Summary

A trip in a Waymo robotaxi still costs more, on average, than a comparable ride in a human-driven Uber or a Lyft. But that gap is narrowing, according to new data published Tuesday by Obi, a company that aggregates real-time pricing and pick-up times across multiple ride-hailing services. Two factors, working together, are behind the change. Waymo has lowered its pricing, at least in the San Francisco Bay Area where the data was pulled, while traditional ride-hailing rides on the Uber and Lyft networks have risen, according to Obi. The new data was collected between November 27 and January 1, with Obi simulating more than 94,000 ride requests in the Bay Area. The company found that Waymo rides cost an average of $19.69, while Uber rides were slightly cheaper at $17.47. Lyft rides across the same period averaged $15.47. In June, Obi released its first report analyzing robotaxi versus ride-hailing data. The data, which was taken from rides in April 2025, showed Waymo rides averaged $20.43, Uber landed at $15.58, and Lyft rides evened out at $14.44. Compared to these figures, Waymo’s average cost has dropped 3.62%, while Uber’s went up 12%, and Lyft’s climbed 7%. Obi CEO Ashwini Anburajan told TechCrunch she believes this is a trend to watch because, while last April’s data implied customers were willing to pay a higher price to ride in a Waymo, the “novelty is wearing off for people in the Bay Area.” That means Waymo will likely keep having to price its offering more competitively, she said. The wildcard: Tesla The wildcard in Obi’s new report is that it collected data on Tesla’s burgeoning robotaxi service, which appears to be far cheaper than these other three offerings. But there are a number of important caveats. For one, Tesla isn’t technically operating a robotaxi service in the San Francisco area, where the data was sampled. Tesla doesn’t have the permits required to operate a driverless commercial robotaxi service in the state. Nor does it have a transportatio...