Waymo has recalled its fleet of nearly 4,000 robotaxis to restrict them from driving on highways while it looks at how to get the vehicles to behave around construction zones.
The recall comes after Waymo found at least 13 instances of its robotaxi driving on sections of freeway that were closed for construction. Six of these occurred in Phoenix, Arizona in April and seven in San Francisco, California in May.
Waymo pulled its robotaxis from all highways on May 19, and a fix for the problem is “currently in development,” according to filings with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). The company does not pull vehicles off the road and still operates on surface roads, although the company has periodically interrupted service during severe weather events that could lead to flooding.
“We identified an area of improvement in performance around freeway construction zones,” the company said in a statement to TechCrunch. “We voluntarily reduced highway operations last month by making improvements, proactively notified state and federal regulators, and decided to submit a voluntary software recall to NHTSA.”
This is the sixth recall that Waymo has issued for its robotaxis. In May, the company recalled its robotic car after it drove on flooded roads, and in December it issued one to address its vehicles’ illegal behavior around school buses. Waymo has previously issued recalls to fix low-speed collisions with chains and gates and telephone poles, and one to fix a problem involving trailer trucks.
The company’s driving software is currently under investigation by NHTSA and the National Transportation Safety Board over its behavior around school buses after one of its robots hit a child near a school in January.
Waymo, owned by Alphabet, says its vehicles have driven more than 170 million miles autonomously and claims they have shown a 13-fold reduction in crashes with serious injuries or worse compared to human drivers.
The robotaxi company is in the midst of a massive expansion, planning to launch in more than 20 cities this year alone, including London and Tokyo. The expansion helped highlight a number of edge cases that Waymo’s robotaxi software has struggled with, which now includes highway construction zones.
Waymo, which began offering freeway rides in November 2025, told NHTSA that its robotaxis “failed to recognize and pass ramp closure signals in pre-planned freeway construction zones” in mid-April in Phoenix. After a review, the company’s “Field Safety Committee” restricted freeway operations in the city while Waymo worked on a fix, NHTSA documents show.
On May 18, seven Waymo robots drove into freeway lanes under active construction in the San Francisco Bay Area because the company’s software “prioritized avoiding other freeway hazards and/or failed to recognize the construction zone.” The company suspended all highway driving the following day. Waymo’s safety board decided to issue the recall on June 8.
Footage of some of these incidents was shared on social media. On May 19, user X @Elliot_slade was posted a video where they claimed a Waymo “crashed through cones” and said it was “chased” by police.
“There were construction signs,” Slade he said CBS News last month. “There were lights on. Police in the distance and speeding up. That’s when I looked at my fiancee, we’re done. That’s it. We’re dead. We’re going to die right here in Waymo.”
According to CBS, Waymo offered Slade “three free rides of up to $40 each in the future.”
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