How the Waymo Driver Handles Severe Winter Weather

Waymo is readying its fleet for severe winter weather, including a historic El Niño season, by expanding the 6th-generation Waymo Driver's cold-weather capabilities. The system combines cameras, radar and lidar with built-in heaters and micro-wipers, measures real-time traction at each wheel, and uses snow tires, while vehicles act as mobile weather stations sharing road data across the fleet. Waymo says it will slow, limit or pause service when conditions exceed its Safety Framework boundaries, and is running closed-course testing and heavy-snowfall data collection in Alaska this season.