Research & Discoveries (R&D): Cruise’s Safety Record Over 1 Million Driverless Miles

On top of the innovation to build autonomous vehicles (AVs), academics and experts around the world are studying how AVs can improve safety, enhance mobility, and create new economic opportunities, among other transformative benefits. Our Research & Discoveries (R&D) Series highlights these reports’ findings about how AVs can create a safer and more mobile world.

Need To Know (NTK): Cruise AVs Outperformed Human Drivers With 54% Fewer Collisions Overall

After its AV fleet drove one million driverless miles, Cruise released a comprehensive safety report on its operations in San Francisco, CA. The data demonstrates that in the first million driverless miles of Cruise’s safety record, their driverless AVs outperformed the human benchmark by encountering fewer collisions, being the primary contributor to fewer collisions, and encountering fewer collisions with meaningful risk of injury.

BY THE NUMBERS

When benchmarked against human drivers in a comparable driving environment, Cruise AVs were involved in:

• 54% fewer collisions overall
• 73% fewer collisions with meaningful risk of injury
• 92% fewer collisions as the primary contributor of the collision

Many of the collisions Cruise AVs encountered were at low speeds and were not caused by the AVs’ driving behavior.

HUMAN DRIVERS VS. CRUISE AVS

Cruise relied upon factors of collision frequency, primary contribution and risk of injury when comparing its AVs to the human ride-hail benchmark.

Based on these measurements, Cruise AVs outperformed the average human driver in San Francisco by a large margin. The company’s first million driverless miles resulted in only 36 collisions, of which 94% were caused by the behavior of other parties. Of these:

• 21% other parties reversed into a stationary Cruise AV
• 26% other parties rear-ended Cruise AV often at stop signs or red lights
• 3% other parties drove the wrong way on a one-way road
• 9% other parties blowing through red lights or stop signs and made contact with a stationary Cruise AV

UNSAFE STATUS QUO 

Contextually, the reality of human drivers is catastrophic: 

• In 2022, nearly 43,000 people were killed in car crashes in the US.
• This represented a 22% increase in traffic-related deaths since 2019.
• Auto collisions continue to be the #1 cause of death for U.S. teenagers.

Research from the RAND Corporation projects that “the deployment of AVs that are on average 10% safer than the average human driver could prevent 600,000 fatalities in the US over 35 years.”

CONCLUSION 

Considering the success of Cruise’s first million AV miles, the company is on the right path to help create an even safer future with featuring fewer collisions and more lives saved. Looking ahead, the company remains steadfastly committed “to drive continuous safety improvements, magnify our impact with scale, and engage with our communities to create a safer, cleaner and more accessible future in transportation."