Autonomous car forecasts

This page lists the most recent predictions about when driverless cars will be available on the market:

Fully autonomous vehicles will be on the road before 2022, says NVIDIA CEO

The CEO of the chipmaker NVIDIA, Jensen Huang, said that “It will take no more than four years to have fully autonomous cars on the road.” This refers to actual cars driving on the road (not just car models being ready technically) and assumes that the key legal issues will also have been resolved.

(Source: Reuters, 2017-10-26 )

Audi to introduce a self-driving car by 2020

Scott Keogh, Head of Audi America announced at the CES 2017 that an Audio that really would drive itself would be available by 2020.

(Source: IEEE Spectrum, 2017-01-05)



NuTonomy to provide self-driving taxi services in Singapore by 2018, expand to 10 cities around the world by 2020

The company has just started trials of its self-driving taxis in Singapore’s 1 North District. It plans to deploy self-driving taxis commercially in Singapore by 2018 and aims to be operational with fleets of self-driving taxis in 10 cities of the world by 2020.

(Source: Yahoo News, 2016-08-29, Digital Trends, 2016-05-24)

Delphi and MobilEye to provide off-the-shelf self-driving system by 2019

Both companies have announced that they will bring a fully self-driving (SAE level 4) system on the market for use in a variety of cars in 2019.

Source: TheVerge, 2016-08-23

Ford CEO announces fully autonomous vehicles for mobility services by 2021

Mark Fields, Ford’s CEO announced that the company plans to offer fully self-driving vehicles by 2021. The vehicles, which will come without steering wheel and pedals, will be targeted to fleets which provide autonomous mobility services. Fields expects that it will take several years longer until Ford will sell autonomous vehicles to the public.

Source: Reuters, 2016-08-16

Volkswagen expects first self driving cars on the market by 2019

Johann Jungwirth, Volkswagen’s appointed head of Digitalization Strategy, expects the first self-driving cars to appear on the market by 2019. He did not claim that these would be Volkswagen models.

Source: Focus, 2016-04-23

GM: Autononomous cars could be deployed by 2020 or sooner

General Motor’s head of foresight and trends Richard Holman said at a confererence in Detroit that most industry participants now think that self-driving cars will be on the road by 2020 or sooner.

Source: Wall Street Journal, 2016-05-10

BMW to launch autonomous iNext in 2021

At their annual shareholder meeting, BMW CEO Harald Krueger said that BMW will launch a self-driving electric vehicle, the BMW iNext, in 2021.

Source: Elektrek, 2016-05-12

Ford’s head of product development: autonomous vehicle on the market by 2020

Raj Nair, Ford’s head of product development, expects that autonomous vehicles of SAE level 4 (which means that the car needs no driver but may not be capable of driving everywhere) will hit the market by 2020.(Source: autonews, 2016-02-27)

Baidu’s Chief Scientist expects large number of self-driving cars on the road by 2019

In an interview session, Andrew Ng, the chief scientist of the Chinese search engine Baidu expects that a large number self-driving self-driving cars will be on the road within three years, and that mass-production will be in full swing by 2021.

(Source: Quora, 2016-01-29)

First autonomous Toyota to be available in 2020

Toyota is starting to overcome its long-standing reluctance with respect to autonomous driving: It plans to bring the first models capable of autonomous highway driving to the market by 2020.

(Source: Wired.com, 2015-10-08)

Elon Musk now expects first fully autonomous Tesla by 2018, approved by 2021

In an interview by Danish newspaper Borsen, Tesla’s founder Elon Musk accelerates his timeline for the introduction of fully autonomous Teslas by 2 years (!) compared to his estimate less than a year ago (October 2014). He now expects fully autonomous Teslas to be ready by 2018 but notes that regulatory approval may take 1 to 3 more years thereafter.

(Source: Borsen Interview on youtube, timeline: 8:06-8:29, recorded on 2015-9-23)

Driverless cars will be in use all over the world by 2025

US Secretary of Transportation stated at the 2015 Frankfurt Auto show that he expects driverless cars to be in use all over the world within the next 10 years.

(Source: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 2015-09-19)

Uber fleet to be driverless by 2030

Uber CEO, Travis Kalanick, has indicated in a tweet that he expects Uber’s fleet to be driverless by 2030. The service will then be so inexpensive and ubiquitous that car ownership will be obsolete.

(Source: Mobility Lab, 2015-08-18)

Ford CEO expects fully autonomous cars by 2020

In an interview with Forbes, Mark Fields, CEO of Ford estimated that fully autonomous vehicles would be available on the market within 5 years. But he was reluctant to claim that Ford would have an autonomous vehicle on the market by then.

(Source: Forbes, 2015-02-09).

Next generation Audi A8 capable of fully autonomous driving in 2017

Stefan Moser, Head of Product and Technology Communications at Audi has announced that the next generation of their A8 limousine will be able to drive itself with full autonomy.

(Source: motoring.com.au, 2014-10-22)

Tesla CEO expects true autonomous driving by 2023

Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla estimates that “five or six years from now we will be able to achieve true autonomous driving where you could literally get in the car, go to sleep and wake up at your destination”. He then added another 2 to 3 years for regulatory approval.

(Source: Huffington Post, 2014-10-15)

Jaguar and Land-Rover to provide fully autonomous cars by 2024 says Director of Research and Technlogy

At the 2014 Paris Motor Show Dr. Wolfgang Epple, Jaguar and Land Rover’s Director of Research and Technology said that about fully autonomous driving: “For Jaguar and Land Rover it will happen within the next 10 years”.

(Source: Drive.com.au, 2014-10-03)

Fully autonomous vehicles could be ready by 2025, predicts Daimler chairman

Dieter Zetsche, chairman of Daimler, predicts that fully autonomous vehicles which can drive without human intervention and might not even have a steering wheel could be available on the market by 2025.

(Source: The Detroit News, 2014-01-13)

Nissan to provide fully autonomous vehicles by 2020

Andy Palmer, the Executive Vice President of California-based Nissan Motors Ltd., has announced that Nissan will make fully autonomous vehicles available to the consumer by 2020. These cars will be able to drive in urban traffic. In contrast to Google’s cars, Palmer claimed that they will not need detailed 3D maps for local navigation.

(Source: Nissan Motors, 2013-08-27)

Truly autonomous cars to populate roads by 2028-2032 estimates insurance think tank executive

At a meeting of the Society of Automotive Engineers, Robert Hartwig, President of the Insurance Information Institute estimated that it will take between 15 and 20 years until truly autonomous vehicles populate US roads.

(Source: The Detroit News, 2013-02-14)

Driverless cars coming to showrooms by 2020 says Nissan’s CEO

During this years’ CES, Carlos Ghosn, CEO of Nissan said that driverless cars will be ready for showtime by the end of this decade.

(Source: Forbes.com, 2013-1-14)

Continental to make fully autonomous driving a reality by 2025

Automotive supplier Continental has just announced that automated driving is at the core of its long-term strategy. It has formed a new business unit for “Advanced driver assistance systems” and plans to make fully autonomous driving available by 2025.

Source: Continental, 2012-12-18

Intel CTO predicts that autonomous car will arrive by 2022

Justin Rattner, CTO of Intel predicts that driverless cars will be available within 10 years. Intel is hoping to equip autonomous smart cars with its Atom and Core processors.

(Source: Computerworld, 2012-10-22)

Sergey Brin plans to have Google driverless car in the market by 2018

Google’s founder Sergey Brin has made it clear that the company plans to have its driverless cars on the market no later than 2018. At the signing ceremony for California’s autonomous vehicles law, he outlined Googles path towards commercialization of its driverless cars. Within 2013 Google plans to expand the number and users of their driverless cars to Google employees. Thereafter it will not take longer than 5 years to get the cars into the market.

(Source: Driverless car market watch, 2012-10-02)

IEEE predicts up to 75% of vehicles will be autonomous in 2040

Expert members of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) have determined that driverless vehicles will be the most viable form of intelligent transportation. They estimate that up to 75% of all vehicles will be autonomous by 2040.

(Source: IEEE, 2012-09-05)