Tesla (TSLA +4.64%) is one of the leaders of the electric vehicle (EV) industry, but investors are more focused on its autonomous full self-driving software (FSD), which CEO Elon Musk believes could help it become the most valuable company in the world.
But Tesla might be falling behind in the autonomous driving race, at least in terms of commercialization. Uber Technologies (UBER +2.89%) operates the world's biggest ride-hailing network, and it partnered with 18 developers of autonomous vehicles, some of which are already hauling passengers.
Can Tesla come out on top over the long term, or is Uber stock the better buy? The answer might surprise you.
Image source: Getty Images.
The case for Tesla
Musk promised Tesla customers self-driving cars since the early 2010s, but he has yet to deliver one that is approved for unsupervised use on public roads in the U.S. Fortunately for the longtime believers, the wait might be over because he's aiming to get the company's Cybercab robotaxi on the road in Texas and California this year.
The Cybercab is a true autonomous vehicle that doesn't come with pedals or even a steering wheel. It runs entirely on Tesla's FSD software, which has been available in beta mode for the last few years in the company's passenger EVs -- strictly in the presence of a human driver, who needs to be ready to take the wheel. Tesla has been releasing safety data for the beta versions of FSD since 2018, and it appears to outperform human drivers by a wide margin.
A Tesla passenger EV with self-driving activated crashes once every 7.44 million miles, on average, compared to one crash every 702,000 miles for American drivers who pilot their car manually (across all brands). This data suggests FSD could reduce car accidents by 90% across the country if everybody uses the software, which is why Musk and his team are confident it will be approved for unsupervised use sometime this year.
NASDAQ: TSLA
Key Data Points
Unsupervised FSD could transform Tesla's economics. The Cybercab will be able to haul passengers and even complete small commercial deliveries around the clock, netting Tesla a consistent revenue stream with high profit margins because there are no human drivers involved. Cathie Wood's Ark Investment Management believes the Cybercab could bring in a whopping $756 billion in annual revenue from autonomous ride-hailing by 2029, assuming FSD receives widespread approval.
But there are several unknowns, like whether FSD will actually receive broad approval from regulators or if the Cybercab will be confined to just a few cities. Plus, Tesla has to build an entire ride-hailing network, and there is no telling whether consumers will migrate from other platforms to use it.
The case for Uber
Uber operates the world's largest ride-hailing network, in addition to a highly successful food delivery service and a commercial freight platform. More than 170 million people use Uber every month, so it has a huge advantage over Tesla, which is starting from scratch. Uber is betting big on autonomous vehicles right now, which could help reduce the enormous cost of its human drivers.
At the end of the first quarter of 2025, Uber had 18 partnerships with developers of autonomous technologies, which was up from 14 just six months earlier. One of those partners is Alphabet's Waymo, which is already completing over 250,000 paid autonomous ride-hailing trips every week in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Phoenix, and Austin.
NYSE: UBER
Key Data Points
According to CEO Dara Khosrowshahi, Uber is facilitating 1.5 million autonomous trips per year (annualized based on its Q1 results). Most of those are attributable to Waymo, which offers its service through its own platform and also through Uber. However, Uber will receive a growing share of that traffic because it's now Waymo's exclusive partner in Austin, and the two companies plan to expand into Atlanta together later this year.
Uber could benefit from autonomous vehicles more than almost any other company because the 8.5 million human drivers in its network are its largest cost by a wide margin. During the first quarter, Uber generated $42.8 billion in gross bookings, which represents the total dollar value users spent on the platform. After Uber paid $18.6 billion to its drivers and made $12.9 billion in merchant payouts (to restaurants for customers' food orders, as an example), the company was left with $11.5 billion in revenue for the quarter.
Then, after deducting operating costs like marketing, it was left with $1.7 billion in profit on a generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) basis.
If Uber can eliminate some of its $18.6 billion in quarterly driver costs (a figure that is constantly growing), more of its gross bookings will immediately flow through to revenue and then to its bottom line as profit.
The verdict
Uber could theoretically partner with an infinite number of developers of self-driving vehicles to automate its entire network without committing practically any capital investment itself. And if some of those partners fail, others will likely swoop in to capture market share, which is one of the benefits of operating the world's biggest network. Every player in this space wants access to the most potential customers, and that's what Uber brings to the table.
Tesla doesn't have that luxury. It will have to spend an enormous amount of money to manufacture Cybercabs, continue improving its FSD software, build a network, and then achieve scale. There is no guarantee it will succeed, and failure could be an existential threat to the company since its EV sales are currently plummeting worldwide, and other products like the Optimus humanoid robot could be years away from generating meaningful revenue.
Plus, Tesla stock trades at an exorbitant valuation right now, which creates a significant downside risk. Its price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio is 171, compared to the 30.6 P/E ratio of the Nasdaq-100 index. The Nasdaq-100 is home to all of Tesla's big-tech peers, many of which are growing their earnings while Tesla's earnings are shrinking, so the EV giant's premium valuation is very difficult to justify.
Although Tesla is the poster child for the self-driving revolution on Wall Street, I think Uber is in a better position to build a successful autonomous ride-hailing business over the long term. Plus, it's extremely difficult to recommend buying Tesla stock at the current prices because any indication that its autonomous ambitions aren't going to plan could drive a sharp correction.
