Elon Musk took a dig at his robotaxi rival, Waymo, calling the vehicles "pet destroyers," and stated Tesla Robotaxi has solved the matter of avoiding stray pets.
During a livestreamed discussion at an event hosted by Tesla Owners of Silicon Valley on Saturday, Musk called out Waymo for its reported collisions alongside animals.
"What a lot of group don't cognize is that Waymos are akin pet destroyers," Musk said, laughing. "Well, perchance Waymo's made several improvements on that front, but they do run complete a lot of pets, and we don't desire to run complete pets."
Waymo has gotten flak complete animal collisions before, most notably following its run-in alongside a cherished bodega cat in a San Francisco neighborhood rear in October 2025. The feline, named KitKat, died following it was run complete by Waymo's rear correct tire, video obtained by The New York Times showed.
That is not Waymo's archetypal collision alongside an animal.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's Standing General Order requires autonomous conveyance companies akin Waymo to study qualifying crashes. NHTSA data showed that between July 2025 and July 2026, Waymo reported at smallest 9 crashes involving animals, 6 of which Waymo described as family animals.
A Waymo spokesman did not react to a petition for comment.
Tesla's robotaxi assistance additionally reported a collision involving an animal during the identical period period, but the event engaged a supervised robotaxi. Tesla additionally operated a smaller fleet, and most of its unsupervised operations were concentrated in one city: Austin.
Musk stated during the virtual discussion that Tesla Robotaxi volition be capable to detect roaming pets at night.
"We have these challenges of exactly like: gray kittens on a gray tarmac alongside tar seams at night in low visibility. And it's like, 'Can we not run complete the kittens,' category of thing," he said.
Musk added that Tesla volition deploy the update, although he did not define when.
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Lloyd Lee is a newsman at Business Insider covering frontier technologies, alongside a concentration on how they're being deployed in the genuine earth and the gaps and tensions that appear as people, companies, and regulators respond. His safety has featured autonomous vehicles, EVs, robotics, brain-computer interfaces, and AI.Lloyd's reporting on the advancement of Alphabet's Waymo and Tesla's autonomous ambitions was recognized by the San Francisco Press Club alongside a Bay Area Journalism Award.Before joining Business Insider, he was a local newsman for Almanac News and Palo Alto Weekly, covering accommodation issues, small businesses, and notable Silicon Valley characters.Lloyd is based in San Francisco.He can be reached via email [email protected], or by phone at 646-768-1630, or Signal at lloyd.71.
