Uber and Nuro begin testing a premium robotaxi service in San Francisco

If you see a Lucid Gravity SUV equipped with sensors — and a self-driving system developed by Nuro — driving around San Francisco, it’s likely an Uber employee giving it a ride.

A select number of Uber employees can now request a ride in a Lucid robotaxi through the Uber app, the latest phase of testing ahead of a planned public launch later this year. Nuru, who provided the update In a blog The vehicles operate in autonomous mode and have a human safety operator behind the wheel as a backup, TechCrunch reported on Monday.

While this is far from a public launch, it indicates the progress the companies have made since the announcement Multi-million dollar partnership and investments In July 2025. Uber invested $300 million in Lucid and separately agreed to buy “at least” 20,000 vehicles of the electric car maker’s new Gravity SUV over the next six years.

These electric vehicles are equipped with Nuro’s autonomous vehicle system, which is powered by Nvidia’s Drive AGX Thor computer. Lucid Gravity Robotaxi, which was It was revealed in Januarywhich is equipped with high-resolution cameras, solid-state lidar sensors and radars that help the autonomous driving system perceive and operate in the real-world environment.

Uber has also invested an undisclosed amount “in the hundreds of millions of dollars” in Nuro.

The plan is for Uber to own and operate – likely with the help of a third party – its premium robotaxi service. Production of these modified Lucid Gravity vehicles is expected to begin in late 2026. According to the regulatory filing Published last year.

Nuro completed closed track testing and began the first public road testing of its self-driving Lucid Gravity SUV late last year. Nuro now has 100 Lucid Gravity SUVs equipped with the autonomous driving system in the engineering fleet, which is used to collect real-world data and test autonomous driving across multiple US cities and states.

According to Nuru, employee test rides help the team evaluate how the autonomous driving experience, vehicle and passenger work together and function in a live operating environment. It also allows the team to test how well the car handles picking up and dropping off passengers, a notoriously difficult process in the field of self-driving taxis.