Tesla begins autonomous driving tests in Austin ahead of launch

According to the Austin, Texas official website, Tesla is now registered as "Known AV Operator in Austin", just like Waymo. The difference is, Tesla's Robotaxi service is still in its testing stage, while Waymo's is in "deployment."

The puzzling part is that Tesla is supposed to officially launch its service by the end of this month, which only leaves a very short testing window. For the past few months, a small fleet of Model Y vehicles drove around with safety drivers on board, and now vehicles without a safety driver have been spotted roaming around Austin. That's just days before the supposed official launch.

For comparison, Waymo tested its service for six months with a safety driver and another six months unsupervised before entering the "deployment stage". This is when the service is allowed to have paying customers.

It could be that Austin's official website is lagging behind, but it's unlikely because we should have seen reports of unmanned Tesla vehicles roaming around Austin long ago.

Via