Uber says it’s ready to roll out driverless cars - but UK government won't approve them until 2027

Uber has said its driverless taxis are ready to roll out onto the streets of the UK, but the government is putting in roadblocks.

Currently, the UK does permit limited self-driving technology, but a driver must also be present and behind the wheel at all times. 

Nonetheless, Uber has said it is ‘ready’ to launch robotaxis as soon as the UK government gives it the green light, and that won’t come before 2027.

In the UK, Uber is working with several different automated car tech companies. 

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In the US, Uber works with several autonomous taxi services, including Waymo, which has robotaxis in Phoenix, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Austin, and Chinese robotaxi startup WeRide that operates in San Jose in California.

But it seems Brits may have a bit longer to wait before they can try out driverless taxis for themselves, despite some companies, such as Uber, being ready to go. 

“We’re ready to launch robotaxis in the UK as soon as the regulatory environment is ready for us,” Uber’s senior vice president of mobility, Andrew Macdonald, told the BBC. 

Fully autonomous vehicles were initially set to be permitted on UK roads by 2026, but the government has since pushed that date back and said legislation is likely to be introduced the following year. 

“We are working quickly and will implement self-driving vehicle legislation in the second half of 2027”, the Department for Transport said in a statement.

The statement went on to say the government was also ‘exploring options for short-term trials and pilots to create the right conditions for a thriving self-driving sector’. 

Macdonald told the BBC that currently, driverless taxis in the US spend about 20 hours on the road per day, seven days a week. 

Once introduced, customers hailing an Uber will be given the choice to opt for an autonomous vehicle if there’s one available.  

But it seems there could be a bit of resistance to the new driverless taxis, at least at first. 

A survey from 2024 found that 37 percent of Brits would feel ‘very unsafe’ in a driverless vehicle, while only four percent said they’d feel ‘very safe’. 

However, Mcdonald told the BBC that any initial trepidation from customers would quickly disappear as it became ‘the new normal’.

We guess time will tell on that one.

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