Waymo Plans Singapore Robotaxi Launch in 2028

Tekedra Mawakana put Waymo’s name on Singapore in the company’s September 17 and 18, 2026 statement. The co-CEO announced plans for a commercial robotaxi launch in 2028, the firm’s first Southeast Asian market, undertaken with the Ministry of Transport and the Land Transport Authority. The target was paid, app-based rides by 2028, framed as a complement to the city’s transit system rather than a replacement for it.

“As we begin our journey here, we are committed to listening to the community, creating high-skilled local operational jobs, and working hand-in-hand with national leaders to complement Singapore's world class public transit network. We are honored to collaborate with the Ministry of Transport and Land Transport Authority to take this thoughtful step forward, bringing our proven commercial safety record to the Lion City,” Mawakana said.

Singapore would become the newest stop on an overseas map that already stretched toward Tokyo, London and Munich. The announcement arrived in a city where autonomous vehicles were already on the road.

Public autonomous shuttles had been open in Punggol since April 2026. Riders boarded fixed-route vehicles with scheduled stops. The trial was already shifting toward point-to-point service across the estate and adding a route to Sengkang General Hospital. Tampines North and Tengah sat on the list of future expansion candidates. Grab had announced its own expansion only days earlier. Working with WeRide, the ride-hailing company planned to grow its autonomous fleet from 10 vehicles to 50 over the next six months, subject to regulatory approvals, and to push coverage beyond the estate where it already ran. ComfortDelGro, paired with Pony.ai, operated in the same corridor. Together they held the first two operator slots. Waymo would become the third.

What Waymo planned was different in kind. Its model was on-demand and app-based, closer to traditional ride-hailing than to the scheduled shuttles already in service: a rider would open an app, request a trip, and be carried fully driverless to a chosen destination. Fixed routes and timed stops would give way to point-to-point requests.

Siow welcomed the company that would follow. “Waymo brings world-class technology and operational expertise to Singapore, and will move us towards our vision of creating new transport options for Singaporeans.”

The vehicle assigned to the work was the all-electric Jaguar I-PACE. Google began its self-driving project in 2009. In 2016 the effort was renamed Waymo and spun out under Alphabet. In 2020 it became the first company to offer a public service without safety drivers. Mawakana has been co-CEO since April 2021.

On September 15, 2026, three days before the Singapore statement, she spoke at a press conference in Japan about Tokyo. “We'll grow our fleet responsibly over time, steadily operating until anyone in Tokyo can download an app and take a ride.” The same end state—an app, a paid ride, no one in the driver’s seat—was now aimed at Singapore, contingent on the safety framework waiting on the other side of the deal.

Mawakana measured the city against the company in the same statement that announced the deal. “Singapore has built one of the safest, most efficient, and most forward-thinking transportation ecosystems in the world.” She added: “Their focus on reliability, sustainability, and human-centric progress directly mirrors how we have built Waymo's technology and service.”

No autonomous vehicle reaches Singapore’s public roads without first clearing CETRAN, the Centre of Excellence for Testing and Research. CETRAN runs the mandatory safety assessment developed with the Land Transport Authority and the Traffic Police; every operator must pass it before deployment. “LTA will work closely with Waymo to ensure that all deployments meet safety and regulatory requirements and build public trust in AVs,” the Land Transport Authority stated.

The year before, Siow had told CNA: “I have no doubt, in five years, we will see many autonomous vehicles in Singapore.” The first roads assigned to Waymo ran through western Singapore, around Labrador and Harbourfront. The zone was set for ordinary trips: commuting to work, weekend outings, and industrial stretches.

That placement landed against a workforce already counted in the tens of thousands. In a July 2026 parliamentary address, Siow set the imbalance in two plain figures. “There are over 70,000 taxi and private-hire car drivers in Singapore. In contrast, we only have around 20 AVs running around on our roads.”

Twenty vehicles against seventy thousand drivers. The gap showed how early the autonomous phase still sat, even as a third operator prepared to enter the western corridors.

The initial fleet of all-electric Jaguar I-PACE vehicles would arrive in the coming months to begin mapping. The cars would collect the road data the system required, because the software could not navigate streets it had not yet recorded. In 2027 trained specialists would take the driver’s seat for the testing phase. They would conduct the early miles by hand, adapting Waymo’s autonomous system to local road geometry, monsoon weather, and dense urban traffic. The software would learn those conditions only while a human still controlled the car. The specialists would stay behind the wheel until the adaptation was complete.

Fully autonomous paid rides booked through the Waymo app were targeted for 2028, subject to Land Transport Authority approval. Until that clearance, the seat stayed filled.