Waymo Recalls Robotaxis Over Risk They'll Drive at Speed Into Freeway Construction Zones

Waymo has filed its fourth safety recall since February 2024, after its driverless cars were caught entering closed freeway construction zones.

The recall, filed with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) on June 17, appears to affect Waymo’s entire US fleet, covering 3,871 vehicles running Waymo’s 5th Generation automated driving system (ADS).

NHTSA estimates 100 precent of the affected units carry the defect, which is outlined in the filed safety recall report as “under certain circumstances, the AV may enter and drive at speed in freeway construction zones due to inappropriately prioritizing the avoidance of other freeway hazards and/or failing to recognize the construction zone.”

Waymo started offering highway rides in late 2025, and the underlying problem appears to be a failure of priority logic. According to the NHTSA filing, the ADS sometimes failed to recognize construction zones, and in other cases actively chose to drive through them because it was busy avoiding other hazards on the freeway. Both conditions can produce the same outcome: a driverless car at highway speed moving through a closed work zone.

The events that triggered the recall apparently began earlier this year. On April 11 and 19, Waymo vehicles in Phoenix drove past ramp closure signs into pre-planned construction zones. Waymo’s Field Safety Committee responded by restricting freeway operations.

Then, on May 18, seven Waymo vehicles in the San Francisco Bay Area drove between construction cones into active lane closures. Though no collisions or injuries were reported from these events, it was this second cluster that prompted a broader freeway ban by the company. Waymo’s Safety Board reviewed the issue on June 1, and on June 8 decided to issue a formal recall.

“Waymo’s mission is to be the world’s most trusted driver, and the data shows that we’re making roads safer in the communities in which we operate,” said a Waymo statement emailed to WIRED. “We identified an area of improvement regarding performance around freeway construction zones. We voluntarily restricted freeway operations last month while making improvements, proactively notified state and federal regulators, and decided to file a voluntary software recall with NHTSA.”

Crucially, a software fix for this potentially dangerous fault does not yet exist. Indeed, the NHTSA filing notes that a permanent remedy is “currently under development.”

Waymo’s interim response is to restrict all its vehicles from entering freeways entirely, a significant operational restriction for a company that previously offered freeway rides in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and Miami.

However, because Waymo owns every vehicle in its fleet, there are no owners to notify. The fix, when it is programmed, will be pushed out as an over-the-air ADS software update.

This is the fourth time in roughly 28 months that Waymo has had to issue a safety recall. In May 2025, Waymo recalled 1,212 robotaxis over collisions with stationary roadway barriers following a NHTSA preliminary evaluation citing at least seven incidents between December 2022 and April 2024. In May this year, Waymo recalled 3,791 vehicles after a robotaxi drove into a flooded, impassable road in San Antonio and was swept into a creek.

This latest recall does not affect Waymo’s newest 6th Generation vehicles, apparently, and the company’s cars will continue to operate service on surface streets in the US.