Waymo is recalling 3,791 robotaxis in the United States after the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration determined that the company’s automated driving system software could allow vehicles to slow and then continue into standing water on higher-speed roadways. The recall, designated NHTSA campaign 26E026000, covers certain fifth and sixth generation Automated Driving Systems (ADS), according to the agency’s filing. Reuters first reported the recall on Tuesday, citing the NHTSA notice. Entering a flooded roadway can cause loss of vehicle control and increase the risk of a crash or injury.
Highlights
- Population: 3,791 robotaxis equipped with 5th and 6th generation Waymo ADS software.
- Defect: Software may allow the vehicle to slow and then drive into standing water on higher-speed roadways.
- Interim remedy completed April 20, 2026: Waymo modified the scope of vehicle operations to add weather-related constraints and updated vehicle maps; a full software remedy is still under development.
- Recall number: NHTSA campaign 26E026000, filed by Waymo LLC of Mountain View, California.
What to Know
Which Waymo vehicles are covered by recall 26E026000?
The recall covers 3,791 robotaxis equipped with certain 5th generation and 6th generation Automated Driving Systems. Waymo owns the entire affected fleet, which operates in cities including Phoenix, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Austin, Atlanta, Miami, and Orlando. Riders are not required to take any action; the company manages all software and mapping updates directly.
What did Waymo do as an interim fix, and is a full remedy available?
As an interim measure, Waymo narrowed where and when its vehicles operate to add weather-related constraints and updated the underlying maps used by the ADS. NHTSA confirmed all 3,791 vehicles received that interim update by April 20, 2026. A full software remedy that resolves the underlying detection and response issue is still under development.
What is the safety risk NHTSA identified?
NHTSA’s recall notice states that the software may allow a Waymo vehicle to slow and then drive into standing water on higher-speed roadways. Entering a flooded roadway can cause a loss of vehicle control and increase the risk of a crash or injury, according to the agency. The recall is classified as an electrical system defect under NHTSA’s component categories.
How does this recall fit into Waymo’s recent NHTSA activity?
This is at least the fourth ADS-related software recall Waymo has filed with NHTSA. Earlier campaigns addressed collisions with towed vehicles (24E-013), pole-like objects (24E-049), chains and gate-like barriers (25E-034), and stopped school buses (25E-084). The flooding recall is the first to cite both 5th and 6th generation ADS software and the largest by affected unit count.
How the Defect Behaves
According to the NHTSA filing, the affected software may allow a Waymo vehicle to slow and then drive into standing water on higher-speed roadways. That sequence — detection of water followed by continued progress into it — is consistent with publicly documented incidents in Texas this spring, including a Waymo vehicle that entered a flooded roadway in San Antonio on April 20, 2026 and was pulled into an active waterway during heavy rainfall. A second San Antonio incident on April 5 saw a Waymo become stranded in high water near McCullough Avenue and Contour Drive. Both vehicles were unoccupied, and no injuries were reported.
Waymo paused commercial operations in San Antonio after the April 20 incident and has indicated service will resume the week of May 11, 2026, after a review of flood-monitoring and severe-weather protocols.
The Interim Remedy
Rather than a software patch resolving the root cause, the current fix is operational. Waymo modified the scope of vehicle operations to add weather-related constraints and updated the maps used by the ADS, according to the recall notice. The interim update reached all 3,791 affected vehicles by April 20, 2026 — the same date as the Salado Creek incident in San Antonio.
A full software remedy is under development. NHTSA has not published a target date for that remedy.
Affected Generations
The recall is the first to encompass both 5th and 6th generation Waymo Driver software. The 5th generation system powers Waymo’s Jaguar I-PACE fleet, which makes up the operational core of the company’s commercial service. The 6th generation Waymo Driver is integrated on newer platforms including the Zeekr RT and is part of Waymo’s scale-up plan for additional cities, supported by the Magna-operated Mesa, Arizona, integration plant that opened in 2025.
Waymo currently operates commercial robotaxi services in Phoenix, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Austin, Atlanta, Miami, and Orlando, with recent expansion into Florida markets that included company-stated testing under tropical rain conditions. The flood-related recall arrives roughly three weeks after that Florida launch.
Industry Context
The 26E026000 filing follows a sequence of ADS-specific recalls by Waymo. NHTSA’s Office of Defects Investigation closed its preliminary evaluation of the 5th generation ADS in July 2025 after Waymo’s two recalls covering pole-like objects (24E-049) and roadway barriers (25E-034) — a closure reported on Self Drive News at the time. Subsequent campaigns covered towed vehicles and stopped school buses (25E-084, filed December 2025).
Reuters noted in its dispatch that Waymo separately faces an open NHTSA probe over a January 2026 incident in which one of its vehicles struck a child near an elementary school in Santa Monica, California, and that the National Transportation Safety Board is investigating January incidents in which Waymo vehicles passed a stopped school bus in Texas. Those matters are distinct from the flooded-roadway recall but reflect continuing regulatory activity around the company’s ADS software.
Owner Action
Because Waymo owns and operates the entire affected fleet, no rider or dealer action is required. All software and mapping updates are deployed over the air. The interim remedy described in the recall notice is complete; the full remedy will be deployed to the fleet by Waymo when validated.
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