Waymo, Uber Eats announce partnership for driverless food delivery in metro Phoenix

PHOENIX – Waymo and Uber are expanding their partnership in metro Phoenix to include a driverless food delivery program through Uber Eats, the companies announced Wednesday.

The service shows up as an option for customers ordering from participating Valley restaurants through the Uber Eats app.

The new food delivery is part of larger partnership between ride-hailing leader Uber and Waymo, the autonomous vehicle company that started as Google’s self-driving car project. In October 2023, Waymo started making its robotaxis available to metro Phoenix riders booking through the Uber app.

Waymo’s own ride-hailing service, Waymo One, launched in the East Valley in October 2022. Waymo One is now available across 225 square miles in Phoenix, Scottsdale, Mesa, Tempe and Chandler — the world’s largest autonomous vehicle service area.

How does Uber Eats food delivery with driverless Waymo vehicles work?

The Waymo-Uber Eats partnership is starting out at select restaurants in Chandler, Tempe and Mesa, including Princess Pita, Filiberto’s and Bosa Donuts.

Customers ordering delivery from participating merchants will receive a prompt that says “autonomous vehicles may deliver your order.” The option to opt-out and choose delivery by a human will be available at checkout.

If the order gets filled by Waymo, a restaurant worker will place the food in the trunk of the vehicle matched for the delivery. The robotaxi will then take the food to the address requested, where the customer can use the Uber Eats app to open the trunk and retrieve the food.

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