Driverless robotaxis are going global, but the dream of self-driving is still in trouble
For nearly a century, humanity has chased the ghost of the self-driving car, a dream that first appeared on the silver screen in 1927’s Metropolis. But in 2025, that dream finally left the projector for the sidewalk. What was once a high-level laboratory experiment is now a $2 billion global industry. India Today Tech takes a look.
Man has been fond of self-driving cars since ancient times. In the movies, the attraction dates back to 1927. Metropolis, a silent feature considered silly and the first science fiction epic of its kind, imagines a futuristic city where sleek, automated vehicles move across elevated highways in a highly coordinated fashion. As they say, if you can imagine it you can build it and so, mankind too, has been on a mission to create these ever since. It was not easy. It took a lot of time. But finally, we seem to be getting there.
At the beginning of the year, when Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai took the I/O stage to give the developer community a glimpse of all the AI his company was preparing to bring into the world, he left the keynote with a very personal anecdote. She told everyone about the time her parents visited her in San Francisco. The first thing they wanted to do was take a ride in a Waymo. Pichai had apparently used Waymo taxis before, but seeing his 80-year-old father be completely amazed by the self-driving technology made him see the progress in a new light, he admitted.
If you can read between the lines, this was the reassurance anyone needed, that the “future” has officially moved from the lab to the end. Not only in San Francisco, but also if you live in Beijing, Phoenix, or Abu Dhabi, seeing a steering wheel spinning on its own is no longer a reason to be scared and call the police: this is how people do brunch today.
Who is winning the race?
According to the Robotaxi Global Market Report 2025, the global robotaxi market is growing rapidly, from $1.19 billion in 2024 to an estimated more than $2 billion this year. The increasing penetration of autonomous technology and the need for sustainable and eco-friendly travel is a big growth driver. With eventual improvements, scale, and affordability, the market size is expected to grow further, reaching tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars by 2030.
Waymo targets 20 million miles driven and 14 million paid rides in 2025 after solid expansion in Phoenix, Los Angeles and San Francisco. Meanwhile, Amazon-owned Zoox continues testing for its unique “toaster-sized” bidirectional pods that lack a steering wheel and can travel up to 75 mph.
In China, Baidu’s Apollo Go dominates on an unprecedented scale in cities like Wuhan and Beijing. By October 31, 2025, it has recorded more than 250,000 weekly fully driverless rides, more than what Waymo reported for its counterpart service in the US in April. Baidu claims that despite its rapid growth, Apollo Go robotaxis have not been involved in any major accidents involving human injury or death. The Chinese government itself is helping accelerate adoption by building “smart roads” with sensors to talk to these robotaxis.
Given all this, Europe is also finally waking up. Waymo recently announced a London launch for 2026, and Germany has become the primary testing ground for SAE Level 4 autonomous driving, supported by some of the strongest regulatory frameworks in the world thanks to the Act on Autonomous Driving.
Behind the scenes, two different types of technologies are now at work. Companies like Waymo and Baidu are following a modular approach where robotaxis use a combination of LiDAR, radar and high-definition (HD) maps, so technically they know every curb and traffic light even before they start the engine. It’s supposed to be super secure, but it’s also expensive to run and scale, while increasing the potential for confusion and possibly malfunction if a map is suddenly updated, but its data is not. To combat this potential drawback and reduce costs, Elon Musk has mandated a “vision-only” approach at Tesla, removing maps and lasers altogether, instead using AI to see and navigate the world. The problem is that without LiDAR, autopilot and Full Self-Driving (FSD) systems lack protection when the cameras are turned off due to glare or heavy rain.
rough spots in the road
Robotaxi Global Market Report Despite a projected 68 percent annual growth rate to 2025, the road to a fully self-driving future is not without obstacles. Obviously, even the smartest AI can be outwitted by a simple power outage. This was recently the case in San Francisco after a local grid failure froze a fleet of modular robotaxis. As traffic lights went dark and HD maps no longer matched intersections on the ground, the robotaxis defaulted to safe mode, basically turning into shiny bricks of metal with nowhere to go and massive traffic jams.
The roads are full of different types of elements. Some people like to be fooled and robotaxis – as luck would have it – are easy targets. As it turns out, you can confuse the sensors and force a car to stop by placing an orange traffic cone on its hood. There are also deep concerns about machine rebellion and job displacement. With 2.5 million robotaxis expected to be on the road by 2030, human taxi and Uber drivers are worried about their livelihoods.
Then there are the edge cases. How does a robotaxi react to a construction worker using hand signals? Or a kid dressed up as a traffic cone for a costume party? Real-world dynamics are so complex that verifying safety would require an incredibly large number of tests, far exceeding any tests that exist for human drivers today.
Why do we still want them?
If the technology is so hard, the question is why do we still want to do it? Driving can be painful and frustrating, especially in busy cities with dangerous traffic, but it can also be remarkably liberating – so why do we want to replace it with sensors, cameras and AI? There are no correct answers. Also, there are no wrong answers. It’s a choice that – given how fast technology is advancing – we’ll have to make at some point.
We know that self-driving cars have some very promising benefits. According to a McKinsey study, the average traveler can save up to 50 minutes a day by using them, time they can spend doing something else like pursuing a hobby or simply taking some much-needed relaxation after a hard day’s work. Plus, all the space you save inside the car can be put to other uses. It could also open up new business avenues for co-working spaces and movie theater chains.
For the visually impaired and the elderly, robotaxis could be a ticket to freedom. Despite headlines about accidents, the data is becoming clear: Robots don’t get drunk, they don’t text while driving, and they don’t get road rage because someone cut them off.
As the world enters the new year, we are also moving beyond the era of “if” and entering the era of “where” for robotaxis. The technology has proven that it can handle the roads. The next shocks will not be technological, they will be legal and social. Who is responsible in an accident? How do we tax robot miles to fix roads?
A driverless world is no longer a dream. It is a real service that many people around the world can download on the App Store. As Pichai said in his closing remarks: It reminds us of the incredible power of technology to inspire, amaze, and move us.