Waymo has officially begun testing its autonomous vehicles on public roads in London. The Alphabet-owned company is preparing to launch a commercial robotaxi service in the city before the end of 2026.
After months of manual driving to map the city, the company has transitioned to autonomous testing. The fleet currently consists of all-electric Jaguar I-Pace vehicles equipped with Waymo's self-driving system.
Safety operators remain behind the wheel during this phase. The company is currently focusing on mastering local driving nuances and validating performance on UK roads.
Expanding European operations
Waymo co-CEO Dmitri Dolgov confirmed the new phase of testing in a recent LinkedIn post. "Core driving AI generalizing very well," Dolgov wrote. He noted that autonomous testing is underway with specialists to prepare for rider-only deployment.
Waymo is also establishing a physical footprint in the United Kingdom. The company is hiring local staff and setting up multiple autonomous vehicle service centers across London.
Part of the rollout includes coordination with local emergency services. Waymo stated it is building the necessary foundation to expand its business throughout Europe.
Full commercial service depends on regulatory approval from the U.K. government. Following its established rollout pattern, Waymo will likely move to driverless testing and employee-only trials before opening the service to the general public.
The company already maintains a presence in the U.K. market. In 2019, Waymo acquired Latent Logic, an Oxford University spinoff specializing in imitation learning machine learning techniques.
