2025 First year of commercialization of autonomous driving: L3 level legally goes on the road, and the cost of Robotaxi is approaching online car-hailing

2025 First year of commercialization of autonomous driving: L3 level legally goes on the road, and the cost of Robotaxi is approaching online car-hailing

With the rapid development of artificial intelligence and autonomous driving technology, 2025 is generally considered by the industry to be a key turning point in the commercialization of autonomous driving. Recently, discussions around the world about the legalization of L3 autonomous driving and the decline in the cost of Robotaxi (autonomous taxis) have become increasingly enthusiastic. This article will combine popular topics and structured data across the entire network for the past 10 days to analyze the technological breakthroughs, policy support and market prospects behind this trend.

1. The legalization process of L3 autonomous driving is accelerated

In 2025, many countries and regions announced that L3 autonomous vehicles can be legally launched on the road, marking the official entry of autonomous driving technology from the testing stage to commercial applications. The following are recent policy trends in major global regions:

Behind the loosening of policies is the maturity of technology. Leading companies represented by Tesla, Huawei, and Waymo have achieved a scenario coverage rate of 99.9% and a takeover rate of less than 0.1 times/1,000 kilometers in testing.

2. Robotaxi operating costs have dropped significantly

According to the latest industry data, Robotaxi's cost per kilometer has dropped from $2.5 in 2020 to $0.6 in 2025, approaching the level of traditional online ride-hailing. The cost reduction is mainly due to the following three factors:

In terms of hardware, the price of lidar has dropped from US$80,000 per unit in 2018 to US$500 per unit in 2025; the improvement in algorithm efficiency has reduced the demand for computing power chips by 50%. Operational data from Baidu Apollo and Cruise show that the Robotaxi fleet without safety officers has been able to achieve 24-hour continuous service.

3. Commercial implementation scenarios are blooming in full swing

In Q1 2025, global autonomous driving commercialization projects showed explosive growth:

It is worth noting thatL3 private passenger car marketAlso growing rapidly. The price of the L3 function optional package launched by brands such as BYD and NIO has dropped to 20,000 yuan, with an activation rate of more than 60%.

4. Challenges and prospects

Despite the broad prospects, the industry still faces challenges such as data security (the average daily data generated by 10TB/car needs to be processed in compliance), ethical algorithms (extreme scenario decision-making mechanism). However, the capital market continues to be optimistic, and the total financing amount in the field of autonomous driving has reached US$32 billion in 2025, an increase of 45% year-on-year.

It can be foreseen that with the virtuous cycle of technological iteration and policy improvement, 2025 will become the first year of the commercialization of autonomous driving in the history of human transportation. When the price difference between Robotaxi and online car-hailing is narrowed to less than 15%, large-scale user migration will be inevitable. This change will not only reshape the travel industry, but will also profoundly change urban transportation planning and energy consumption structure.