Waymo Begins Public Service of Ojai Robotaxi With 6th-Gen Tech
The Ojai rollout is the first commercial deployment of Waymo's sixth-generation hardware, which the company claims significantly improves all-weather and low-light driving capability, a key hurdle for scaling robotaxi fleets.
Reporting from 1 sources: GIGAZINE.
Waymo announced on May 29, 2026, that it is rolling out public service of its new robotaxi, the Ojai, which carries the company's sixth-generation autonomous driving system. The Ojai is an electric minivan co-developed with Chinese automaker Geely and was first unveiled in February 2026. Waymo says the sixth-generation Waymo Driver has upgraded sensors and vision systems that allow safer operation in bad weather and on unlit roads. The vehicle has been tested by Waymo employees in San Francisco and Los Angeles over the past several months. Initially, only a limited group of selected users in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Phoenix will be able to ride the Ojai. Waymo plans to expand service to Denver, Las Vegas, and San Diego over time, and expects all users to have access by late 2026. The announcement marks the first time the general public can ride a vehicle equipped with Waymo's newest autonomous driving hardware.
The Ojai is the first production vehicle to integrate Waymo's sixth-generation sensor suite, which the company says reduces reliance on high-definition maps by using more powerful onboard vision processing. Waymo and Geely jointly developed the minivan platform, though Geely's role is limited to vehicle manufacturing; all autonomy hardware and software come from Waymo. The initial service area covers parts of San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Phoenix, with Denver, Las Vegas, and San Diego slated for later expansion. Waymo has not disclosed the exact number of Ojai vehicles in the initial fleet, nor the pricing structure for rides. The company previously tested the sixth-generation system on modified Jaguar I-Pace vehicles, but the Ojai is the first purpose-built model for the new hardware. Waymo's blog post accompanying the announcement emphasized that the Ojai has logged thousands of miles of employee testing before today's public launch.
Synthesized by Yomimono from the 1 cited source below, including Japanese-language reporting where cited, then editorially reviewed before publishing.