Link to a Tesla robotaxi and chaser car presumably with the teleoperator ready to take over if the robotaxi makes a mistake.

https://www.reddit.com/r/SelfDrivingCars/s/6H4vhmPzuP

Whether this is impressive to you or not probably depends on your bias going in.

@WrongoPhD the new goal post is "there is a chaser car behind it so it doesn't count"

@MarkosGiannopoulos it's a robo taxi service that requires no human driver whatsoever apart from the one who follows the robotaxi with his hands on the controls ready to take over and another driver to drive that person around.

@WrongoPhD For now, what you see is testing.

@MarkosGiannopoulos they always move the goal post, they don’t understand this at all fundamental level

@MolbyDick what don’t ‘they’ understand?

@MarkosGiannopoulos someone keeps moving the goalposts for sure

"Tesla was listed as a "known" autonomous vehicle, or AV, operator in Austin as of June 9, according to the Austin Department of Motor Vehicles website."

Anyone who doubts this, oh boi ur in for a rude awakening

@MolbyDick

@WrongoPhD Tesla won’t be using teleportations to drive their vehicles only for emergency situations like Waymo, silly!

While I don't think the tele operators are going to be controlling the car all of the time, they are going to be watching the car 100% of the time and ready to intervene by then remotely driving the car, including at normal driving speeds.

Unless FSD improves in 2025 enough to not require remote supervision and rescue driving at normal driving speed, this should still resolve as a no.

@WrongoPhD wait so ur setting a bigger standard for Tesla then Waymo? Why not hold them at the same standard? And no they won’t be watching all of them all the time. It’s only in emergency situations, etc. this has been stated already

>"they are going to be watching the car 100% of the time and ready to intervene"

For initial tests, yes I think that is highly likely, and if it continues to be the case then it should resolve no. However this isn't cheaper than normal taxis it is more expensive and so no point doing this unless aim is to considerably reduce the man-hours to make it profitable. How quickly Tesla can move towards that (before year end?) and how much info we get on this may well be a bit uncertain.

Musk has claimed they have started a month early but would not be at all surprised if it is only employees taking rides so far. It is where we get to by end of year which matters for this question.

@MolbyDick FSD does not work well enough to know when it's in an emergency situation, which is why it will be monitored all the time and why it's not analogous to Waymo. Waymo only gets remote assistance when it asks for help.

@WrongoPhD you are absolutely delusional with this comment. you have no idea how good the latest build of FSD is internally, and Tesla will be scaling to hundreds of cars this year if not thousands, they already stated that they will be scaling this year to hundreds of cars and many cities and that the cars won’t be watched 100% of the time.

Maybe for the first 2-3 weeks?

https://x.com/SawyerMerritt/status/1932478438775902575
"BREAKING: First ever Tesla Model Y robotaxi with no-one in the drivers seat spotted testing on public roads in Austin, Texas!"
June 10 2025

Being fully watched remotely is still possible, maybe likely. About 2 weeks after first testing with someone in driver/front passenger seat. So maybe an indication that testing is going to evolve rapidly?

https://robime.it/user/w2gsolutions3/

https://www.warriorforum.com/members/w2gsolutions3.html

https://www.edocr.com/user/w2gsolutions3

https://www.construct.net/en/users/2000724/w2gsolutions3

@GabeGarboden Could you confirm if "fully autonomous" means level 4 autonomy, like Waymo has? Namely, no human in the driver's seat and no tele-operation at driving speeds, though the car can get remote assistance from a human to get out of weird situations after the car has stopped on its own.

@dreev Yes, this is what I’m looking for and fits the intent of the question.

The only part I’d challenge is remote operation takeover has to be after the car has stopped on its own. I could see a situation where the car is traveling at a few miles per hour, but it’s unsure so still sends out a signal for takeover. Probably a useless distinction/NA since the practicalities are the same but thought I’d mention.

@GabeGarboden Thanks! I agree that we're unlikely to end up in this particular corner case but I want to get this clarified in my own self-driving markets as well so I should make sure I'm understanding your disambiguation. Are you challenging or agreeing with the part about stopping before getting a remote takeover? I guess there are a couple possible lines to draw:

1. The car has to stop on its own before getting remote assistance. That remote assistance may involve tele-operation at walking speed for some car-lengths of distance, strictly to get the car out of danger, like onto a shoulder.

2. Any tele-operation at walking speed or slower is allowed.

So number 1 is slightly stricter and I believe Waymo satisfies it. If you prefer number 2 or if you think neither is quite the right line to draw, let us know!

@dreev I’m fine with either but to be honest I don’t think we’ll get exact clarity/specifics. My main point was that Tesla’s tech is fundamentally different from Waymo‘s so any tele-operation may work differently as well. I think as long as it’s clear that tele-operation is used only for the purpose of taking over when a vehicle is unclear/stuck, then that’s fine. It’s my understanding that Waymo interventions are frequent, albeit decreasing overtime as the tech improves. Also, tele-operation of some kind will likely be needed for all AV’s for a very, very long time.

@GabeGarboden But if the car ever decides it's unclear/stuck while traveling at highway speed... I mean, that case is obvious but the point is to pick a specific bright line. Maybe "no tele-operation above walking speed" is simplest. No quibbles about what it means to be stuck or coming to a stop first, or even how often humans intervene. As long as the car is always autonomous at, say, 5 km/h and above, that counts. I believe Waymo clears that bar easily.

Forbes is now reporting that the robotaxi launch in August with have remote safety drivers and be invite only. I think the headline really captures what's going on: "Tesla Robotaxi Will Have ‘Lots Of Tele-Ops’—Which Means Supervised FSD”

https://www.forbes.com/sites/bradtempleton/2025/05/17/tesla-robotaxi-will-have-lots-of-tele-ops-ie-supervised-fsd/

Similar prediction for end of August: https://manifold.markets/dreev/will-tesla-count-as-a-waymo-competi

Will Tesla launch level 4 robotaxis this summer?

12% chance. Elon Musk has been very explicit in promising a robotaxi launch in Austin in June with level 4 autonomy -- what Tesla calls unsupervised full self-driving (FSD). We'll give him some leeway on the timing and say this counts as a YES if it happens by the end of August. So far Tesla seems to be testing this with employees and with supervised FSD and doubling down on an Austin launch in June. FAQ 1. Does it have to be a public launch? Yes, but we won't quibble about waitlists. As long as even 10 members of the public have used the service by the end of August, that's a YES. Also if there's a waitlist, anyone has to be able to get on it and there has to be intent to scale up. In other words, Tesla robotaxis have to be actually becoming a thing, with summer 2025 as when it started. 2. What if there's a human backup driver in the driver's seat? This importantly does not count. That's level 2 autonomy aka supervised FSD. 3. But what if the backup driver never actually intervenes? Compare to Waymo, which goes millions of miles between any kind of incident. If there's a backup driver we're going to presume that it's because Tesla is not at level 4 autonomy. 4. What if it's only available for certain fixed routes? That would resolve NO. It has to be available on unrestricted public roads and you have to be able to choose an arbitrary destination. I.e., it has to count as a taxi service. 5. What if it's only available in a certain neighborhood? This we'll allow. It just has to be a big enough neighborhood that it makes sense to use a taxi. Basically anything that isn't a drastic restriction of the environment. Ask more clarifying questions in the comments! I'll be super transparent about my thinking and will make sure the resolution is fair if I have a conflict of interest. [Ignore any auto-generated clarifications below this line. I'll add to the FAQ as needed.]