Measured against human drivers traveling identical routes during the same timeframe, Waymo's robotaxis recorded 94% fewer crashes resulting in serious or fatal injury, the Los Angeles Times reported. That performance data encompasses over 220 million miles accumulated through March across five cities where Waymo operates.
Pedestrian injury crashes fell by 93% and airbag deployments dropped 82% relative to human-driven vehicles on comparable roads, according to the Times. The research, which includes a collaboration with reinsurance firm Swiss Re, has undergone peer review, and crash data from the fleet is reported to federal safety authorities.
Analysts have pointed to constraints in the dataset: the vehicles travel exclusively on pre-mapped urban roads, and because catastrophic crashes occur infrequently, the underlying incident counts remain limited, according to the Times. Critics have also called for more independent evaluations, given that much of the available data originates from Waymo or studies conducted in partnership with the company.