Waymo tells riders to get ready for fully driverless rides

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Waymo will begin offering fully driverless rides to ordinary people in the Phoenix area, the company revealed in a Wednesday email to participants of its Early Rider Program. The email was obtained by Techcrunch reporter Kirsten Korosec.

Waymo first began testing fully driverless rides in November 2017, and the company had planned to begin offering driverless rides to paying customers in 2018. The company even made a commercial, starring Jimmy Kimmel, touting the company’s driverless technology.

But the planned commercial launch of driverless technology didn’t happen. Instead, Waymo launched a limited commercial service called Waymo One in December 2018, with safety drivers behind the wheel of every vehicle. Since then, the company has said little about fully driverless technology.