Uber and Nuro Launch Employee-Only Lucid Gravity Robotaxi Testing in San Francisco
If you spot a sensor-laden Lucid Gravity SUV fitted with Nuro’s self-driving system navigating the streets of San Francisco, there’s a strong chance that vehicle is carrying an Uber employee on a test ride.
A small, selected group of Uber employees can now book rides in these Lucid robotaxis directly through the standard Uber app. This program marks the latest testing phase ahead of the companies’ planned full public launch scheduled for later this year. Nuro shared the update in a blog post published Monday, and confirmed to TechCrunch that while the vehicles run in full autonomous mode, a trained human safety operator remains behind the wheel as a backup.
This is still far from a public commercial launch, but it signals clear progress for the partnership first announced alongside a multi-million-dollar investment deal back in July 2025. As part of that initial agreement, Uber put $300 million into Lucid, and separately signed a deal to purchase at least 20,000 of the EV maker’s new Gravity SUVs over the next six years.
All of these electric vehicles are equipped with Nuro’s full autonomous driving system, which runs on Nvidia’s powerful Drive AGX Thor computer. The Lucid Gravity robotaxi, first unveiled in January, comes fitted with a full sensor suite including high-resolution cameras, solid-state lidar, and radar. These tools allow the self-driving system to accurately perceive and navigate complex real-world driving environments.
Beyond its investment in Lucid, Uber also poured an undisclosed multi-hundred-million-dollar sum into Nuro as part of the broader partnership.
The long-term plan calls for Uber to own and operate the premium robotaxi service, likely with support from a third-party partner. According to a regulatory filing published last year, production of these specially modified Lucid Gravity vehicles is expected to begin in late 2026.
Nuro already completed closed-course testing for the platform, and launched its first public road testing of the autonomous Lucid Gravity SUVs late last year. Today, Nuro’s engineering fleet includes 100 Lucid Gravity SUVs outfitted with its self-driving system, deployed across multiple U.S. cities and states to collect real-world data and test autonomous performance in varied conditions.
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Per Nuro, the employee-only test program helps the development team evaluate how the full autonomy stack, vehicle hardware, and end-to-end rider experience work together in a live, real-world operating environment. It also lets the team test how well vehicles handle rider pickups and drop-offs, a famously complex and tricky task for autonomous ride-hailing services.
Uber and Nuro Launch Employee-Only Lucid Gravity Robotaxi Testing in San Francisco
