As Waymo puts more robotaxis on Los Angeles streets, the raw number of reported crashes has climbed with them. A Los Angeles Times review of filings to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration finds most of those incidents were still minor fender-benders.
In Los Angeles County, Waymo reported 69 crashes in 2024, 219 in 2025 and 186 so far this year, according to figures compiled on the California Autonomous Vehicle Crash Dashboard built by Matthew Raifman and colleagues at UC Berkeley’s SafeTREC. Statewide, Waymo logged more than 590 crashes in California in 2025, nearly double the 304 recorded in 2024.
What the LA filings show
Of this year’s LA County reports, more than 80% showed no apparent injuries. Eighty-two crashes happened while the Waymo was stopped and 65 while it was driving straight. Filings so far count 149 collisions with a passenger vehicle, 11 with a heavy truck and two with a first-responder vehicle.
Many of the reports describe other road users hitting a stationary robotaxi. One Waymo that moved over for an emergency vehicle was struck by that vehicle and had to be towed, with no injuries. Another waiting at a light was rear-ended by a truck; Waymo said the customer alleged minor injuries. Locations and further detail are often redacted in the public filings.
Experts note that AV crash reports capture many low-speed knocks that human drivers would often never report to police.
Per mile, Waymo says the trend is down
A rising crash count does not by itself mean each mile is more dangerous. Waymo’s reported rate fell from about 57 crashes per million miles in 2023 to fewer than six this year, the Times says.
In a 24 September safety update, Waymo said its driverless fleet had covered more than 270 million autonomous miles through June 2026 across Atlanta, Austin, Los Angeles, Phoenix and San Francisco — roughly 300 human lifetimes of driving, or Route 66 more than 110,000 times. The company estimates it was involved in 841 fewer injury-causing crashes than human drivers would have been over that distance, an 82% reduction, and 95% fewer serious-injury-or-worse crashes. Across about 67 million miles in Los Angeles, Waymo reported zero crashes with serious or fatal injuries, against 11 expected for human drivers over the same distance.
Kris Kusano, who oversees safety data research at Waymo, told the Times the company treats every crash and close call as a chance to improve, and that the data show the vehicles are safer than average drivers in the cities where they run.
Caveats, rivals and city pushback
Raifman said California is absorbing a lot of that trial and error as a national testing bed. He and other researchers stress that today’s safety numbers come from fleets running in limited conditions and mild weather — not proof that every AV system, everywhere, is safer than human driving.
Amazon’s Zoox is testing in Los Angeles and San Francisco and has been involved in 18 crashes in California this year, according to NHTSA data cited by the Times. Tesla’s Cybercab and other services are expected to expand; Tesla does not use lidar, unlike Waymo and Zoox, and federal regulators have been examining whether the Austin Cybercab was properly certified.
Cities want more say. San Diego’s council has asked the state for authority over when and how robotaxis are deployed; the California Public Utilities Commission currently governs expansion into new cities. Culver City has moved to set rules on charging, storage and cleaning, and Santa Monica has fought Waymo over noisy charging depots.
William Riggs, who leads the Autonomous Vehicles and the City Initiative at the University of San Francisco, said the best high-performance systems are colliding less often than human drivers right now — but that is not the same as saying the whole AV industry is safer.