Tesla started its Robotaxi service in Fort Worth, Texas, on Monday, a city that was not among the four it had listed as next in line less than two weeks ago, and its first new city since July.
“Robotaxi available in Fort Worth starting tomorrow, 6am,” the company’s Robotaxi account posted on X on Sunday, sharing a map of what it called the “Launch geofence.”
Fort Worth becomes the seventh city in Tesla’s paid Robotaxi network and its fourth in Texas, after Austin, Dallas and Houston. Tesla also serves Miami, Orlando and Tampa in Florida.
On October 21, Tesla listed Las Vegas, Phoenix, Jacksonville and San Antonio as “coming soon” on its Robotaxi safety page, without giving dates. None of those four has launched.
“Interesting that this newest robotaxi city, Fort Worth, wasn’t even on the most recent cities coming soon list,” Chuck Cook, a Tesla owner known for testing Full Self-Driving, wrote on X.
The Launch Zone
The map Tesla shared shows a single zone centered on downtown Fort Worth. It reaches north toward Saginaw, west past White Settlement and southwest to Benbrook, with its eastern edge near Haltom City and Forest Hill.
Tesla did not give the size of the area, and independent estimates differ.
Sawyer Merritt put it at 143 square miles in a list of Tesla’s service areas he shared on X, which would make it the network’s third-largest after Austin at 272 square miles and Houston at 254. A tracing of the same launch map by the Robotaxi Log site put it at about 104 square miles.
Both estimates make the Fort Worth zone larger than Tesla’s Dallas service area, which covers about 81 square miles after it more than doubled in late August.
The two zones are not connected. They are separated by Arlington, Grand Prairie and Irving, so riders cannot travel between the two cities.
Tesla also has not said how many vehicles it assigned to Fort Worth.
From Dallas to Fort Worth
Tesla launched unsupervised rides in Dallas and Houston on April 18, its first expansion beyond Austin. Miami followed on July 3, and Orlando and Tampa later that month.
Most of the network’s recent growth had come within those cities rather than from new ones. On October 26, Tesla’s Robotaxi account announced a roughly tenfold expansion of its Houston zone with the post “Houston, we have liftoff. Bigger service area now live.”
The next day, Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk replied “Coming soon” when Florida Governor Ron DeSantis asked for the Tampa and Miami zones to include the beaches.
Behind Earlier Targets
The pace of new launches trails what Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk set out at the start of the year.
On Tesla’s fourth-quarter earnings call on January 28, Musk said he expected fully autonomous vehicles in “somewhere between a quarter and half of the United States by the end of the year, pending regulatory approval.” He added that Tesla expected to be in “dozens of major cities” by year-end.
Tesla’s update released that day listed seven metro areas for the first half of 2026: Dallas, Houston, Phoenix, Miami, Orlando, Tampa and Las Vegas. Five of them launched by July. Phoenix and Las Vegas remain on the “coming soon” list.
On the first-quarter call in April, Musk said Tesla hoped to have unsupervised FSD or Robotaxi “operating in, I don’t know, a dozen or so states by the end of this year.” Tesla’s driverless service so far runs in two states, Texas and Florida.
Musk also said in April that unsupervised FSD would reach customer cars “probably in the fourth quarter.” Elluswamy said in October that Tesla expected to add the first customer vehicles to its Robotaxi fleet “around Q2 next year.”
Cybercab Next in the Metroplex
Fort Worth’s launch comes as Tesla prepares to bring its two-seat Cybercab to the Dallas area.
“In fact, next month we’ll be launching in Dallas,” Ashok Elluswamy, Tesla’s Vice President of AI Software, told analysts on the company’s third-quarter earnings call on October 21. He had said earlier in October that the Cybercab was coming to Dallas “soon.”
The Cybercab, which has no steering wheel or pedals, has carried paying riders only in Austin since September 3. Tesla said on October 10 that the fleet there had passed 300 vehicles, and it has been registering the cars in Texas at a fast pace.
“We do six cities now,” Elluswamy said on the call, describing a strategy of adding cities while also concentrating vehicles in Austin. “There’s no fundamental reason that we are limited to Austin.”
Chief Financial Officer Vaibhav Taneja said Tesla plans to bring the Cybercab to “some other cities before the end of this year.”
Tesla’s third-quarter update named no city other than Austin.
Tesla is also answering US safety regulators about how it certified the Cybercab, after the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration granted it 30 more days to respond.
Permits Waiting Elsewhere
Fort Worth’s launch contrasts with two cities where Tesla already holds approval.
Nevada’s Transportation Authority cleared Tesla on August 20 to run up to 5,000 fully autonomous vehicles in Clark County, which includes Las Vegas, in the first 12 months after its permit is issued, according to the agency. Tesla must start operations within 120 days of the permit being issued.
Miles and Hours
Tesla’s safety page credits its robotaxis with about 3.1 million miles without a safety employee on board between January 22 and October 18, about 70% of them since late August. Austin accounted for 2.12 million of those miles and Dallas for 608,130.
Fort Worth riders can book from 6 a.m., according to Tesla’s post. The Robotaxi account said on October 29 that “operating hours are now 6am – 2am,” up from an 11 p.m. cutoff earlier in October. Elluswamy said on the call that Tesla aims to run around the clock by the end of the year.
Musk has said the main limit on night hours is avoiding pets in the dark.
Tesla extended Austin hours for the Formula 1 race weekend in October.
Tesla had 1,051 robotaxis registered in Texas in late October, including 544 Cybercabs, according to Robotaxi Tracker.
Tesla also aims to deliver Cybercabs to customers by the end of 2026, though executives said most will stay in its own fleet.
