A few years ago, our team asked the question: what could a fully self-driving car — one that doesn’t require a human behind the wheel — look like? Out of these conversations came our prototype vehicle, built from the ground up with no steering wheel or pedals, designed to take you from A to B at the push of a button. Today, we’re proud to say that our prototype vehicle has won the Red Dot: Luminary award, recognizing a new kind of vehicle where the sensors and software do all the driving.

We’re honored to have been considered alongside 4,698 design projects from 60 countries, and to be recognized for “integrating technology, design and innovation in the service of human beings to improving their daily lives.” We hope to improve people’s lives is by making our roads safer, and our prototype vehicle is a reflection of that.

The geometry of our prototype vehicle is specially designed for safety. We built it so that our sensors can see 360 degrees and up to two football fields ahead, often detecting pedestrians, cyclists and cars well before a human driver. The front exterior is made of a soft foam and the windshield from a flexible polycarbonate so that our cars can absorb the energy of an impact, keeping pedestrians safer. When we drive, our vehicle emits an audible hum so that people know we’re there — an especially helpful feature for those with visual impairments.

We’re excited and honored that Red Dot has recognized the design considerations that went into building a safe, fully self-driving car. 

For the past few years, members of our team have been working from the Greater Detroit area. Now it’s time to lay down roots: we’re establishing a self-driving technology development center in Novi, MI.

Many of our current partners are based here, so having a local facility will help us collaborate more easily and access Michigan's top talent in vehicle development and engineering. At this 53,000 sq ft development center, our engineers, working with local partners, will further develop and refine self-driving technology. One of the first tasks will be to ready our self-driving Chrysler Pacifica hybrid minivans.

We’ll begin moving in throughout 2016, but as you can see, there’s some work to do before it feels like home!

Hello Valley of the Sun!

Metro Phoenix is the next stop for our self-driving car testing program. This new location will give our cars a chance to practice driving in a desert environment — and experience handling some of Phoenix’s quirks, like cacti, golf cart crossings, and time-based speed limits.

If you’re a local, you may see one of our Lexus RX450h SUVs driving around the area. We’d love to hear what you think, about how we’re driving, and what you would want to do with a self-driving car. Visit google.com/selfdrivingcar to drop our team a note!

Our prototype vehicles in Austin are sporting a new look! Six of our prototypes now feature Austin-themed "Paint the Town" artwork created by local artists such as Flo Swanson, a 94 year old artist who gave up driving over a decade ago, as well as Cathy Malloy and Anna Vaught, a mother-and-daughter pair who depicted iconic scenes such as the bats on the Congress Avenue bridge and kayakers on Lady Bird Lake. Learn more about the artwork at www.google.com/selfdrivingcar/paint.

Over the weekend, 94-year-old Florence Swanson took a ride in one of our Lexus self-driving cars. Florence gave up the keys to her own car more than a decade ago, but soon her artwork - of a man playing a guitar, inspired by her grandson - will appear on a prototype vehicle driving around Austin, TX. 

You can see Flo's artwork, as well as designs from the rest of our Paint The Town: Austin artists at www.google.com/selfdrivingcar/paint.

Thanks to +U.S. Department of State Secretary Kerry for stopping by and taking a look at our prototype vehicle!

We’ve expanded our testing program to a total of four U.S. cities over the last several months, so it’s time to add more vehicles to our fleet. We’re planning to more than double our fleet with the initial addition of about 100 new 2017 Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid minivans, and we hope the first few will be on the road by the end of this year.

This collaboration with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (FCA) is the first time we’ve worked directly with an automaker to create our vehicles. FCA will design the minivans so it’s easy for us to install our self-driving systems, including the computers that hold our self-driving software, and the sensors that enable our software to see what’s on the road around the vehicle. The minivan design also gives us an opportunity to test a larger vehicle that could be easier for passengers to enter and exit, particularly with features like hands-free sliding doors.

In the coming months, our team will collaborate closely with FCA engineers. This experience will help both teams better understand how to create a fully self-driving car that can take you from A to B with the touch of a button. Collaborations like these are an important part of realizing the potential of self-driving technology to improve road safety and make transportation more accessible for millions of people.

Hello Kirkland, WA! We’ve chosen your beautiful city by Lake Washington as the next location of our self-driving car testing program.

After self-driving 1.4 million miles, we’re ready to give our cars more experience driving new environments, traffic patterns, and road conditions. (And we definitely don't mind the waterfront views either!)

From today, locals may see one of our Lexus RX450h SUVs driving around North Kirkland. We’d love to hear what you think, about how we’re driving, and what you would want to do with a self-driving car! Visit google.com/selfdrivingcar to drop our team a note!

Bats, armadillos, music, Lady Bird Lake and more. We saw many iconic symbols of Austin represented in the submissions for Paint the Town: Austin! Take a look at the final selected artwork from Anna Vaught, Andy Nelson, Annette Neu, Catherine Malloy, Cathy Carr Haynes, Florence Swanson, Tracy Greene, Sondra Vine, Gwen Dennis, and Christiana Guzman at www.google.com/selfdrivingcar/paint/austin, and keep an eye out for their designs on our prototype vehicles early next year.

Thank you to everyone who submitted artwork, and everyone who came to our Paint the Town pop-up gallery at Big Medium’s East Austin Studio Tour over the weekend. It’s been such a pleasure getting to meet more Austinites!