Tesla has announced plans to introduce its first paid autonomous ride-hailing service in Austin, Texas, in June 2025. CEO Elon Musk made the announcement during Tesla’s Q4 2024 earnings call, emphasizing that the rollout will be cautious and gradual to ensure safety and regulatory compliance.
Unlike the current FSD (Supervised) system, which requires drivers to remain attentive, the Austin launch will feature Tesla’s FSD Unsupervised system with autonomous vehicles operating in real-world conditions. These vehicles will navigate city streets without human intervention, marking a milestone in Tesla’s pursuit of self-driving technology.
“So, we’re going to be launching unsupervised full self-driving as a paid service in Austin in June. We feel confident in being able to do an initial launch of unsupervised, no one in the car, full self-driving in Austin in June.”
A Gradual Rollout
Tesla’s approach to launching its robotaxi service will mirror its broader software deployment strategy—starting with internal Tesla-owned vehicles to test the technology before allowing private owners to list their own cars for ride-hailing. Musk stated that personal Teslas joining the fleet won’t be possible until at least 2026, as the company first needs to validate the system’s safety, payment mechanisms, and customer experience.
“We’re not splitting the atom here,” Musk said. “It’s just a bunch of work that needs to be done to make sure the whole thing works efficiently.”
Austin was selected as the launch city due to its regulatory environment and Tesla’s strong presence in the region, including nearby Giga Texas. The company has also been in discussions with local officials to ensure smooth integration with city infrastructure.
Expansion Beyond Austin
Musk highlighted that the service will initially be limited to Austin as part of a controlled pilot program. While Musk’s previous predictions for full autonomy have yet to come to fruition, this announcement is his most concrete timeline yet. Previously Musk suggested a near simultaneous launch in Texas and California, and on Wednesday Musk appeared to signal a slight delay for the California launch, saying it would happen before the end of the year.
Without providing specifics, Musk added that the service will expand to several other US cities this year, before being available in “almost every market,” presumably within the US pending regulatory approvals, in 2026.
“I’m confident that we’ll release unsupervised FSD California this year as well. Yes, in fact, I think we will most likely release unsupervised FSD in many regions of the country of the US by the end of this year,” Musk said.
Tesla’s Vision for Autonomy
Tesla’s approach to self-driving differs from robotaxi services like Waymo and Cruise, which rely on high-definition maps and expensive sensor suites, including LiDAR. Instead, the company relies on Tesla Vision, software built on a camera-based neural network trained on billions of real-world miles driven by Tesla vehicles worldwide.
“Our solution is a generalized AI solution, it does not require high-precision maps of a locality,” Musk explained. “So we just want to be cautious. It’s not that it doesn’t work beyond Austin. In fact, it does. We just want to put a toe in the water, make sure everything is okay.”
