Lyft Says Waymo Supply-Sharing Launches Before Year-End as Nashville Depot Nears Completion, Reports Record 30 Million Riders
Q2 2026 earnings call, August 6, 2026
Lyft closed out the second quarter with its strongest operating metrics to date, crossing 30 million active riders for the first time and delivering 262 million rides, putting the company on pace to exceed 1 billion rides for full-year 2026. Gross bookings rose 23% year-over-year to $5.5 billion, while adjusted EBITDA grew 37%, marking the fourth consecutive quarter of over $1 billion in trailing-twelve-month free cash flow. CFO Erin Brewer characterized the quarter as evidence the company is "building a business that is both high growth and highly disciplined."
Waymo Partnership Reaches Operational Milestone in Nashville
The most concrete new data point from the call centered on Lyft's autonomous vehicle partnership with Waymo in Nashville. CEO David Risher disclosed that Lyft's staff took over operations of Waymo's temporary depot on June 9, describing the transition as "seamless," even amid a complicated weather day, and said the team is now "exceeding all of our SLAs" with Waymo. The purpose-built depot — an 80,000-square-foot former USPS facility outfitted with 4 megawatts of power and capacity for hundreds of vehicles — remains on track to open in October.
More importantly for investors modeling the AV timeline, Risher confirmed that consumer-facing supply-sharing, where riders can be matched with a Waymo vehicle directly through the Lyft app, will begin "before the end of the year," though he declined to give an exact date. He also laid out the four pillars on which Lyft expects to be judged as an AV distribution partner: marketplace health, regulatory navigation, real estate siting, and the AV technology itself, with fleet operations and supply-sharing execution carrying the most weight. Risher was careful to frame this as a template rather than a one-off: "We did not do all this work just to do it in one place."
On unit economics, Brewer tempered expectations for a near-term inflection. Given the small current vehicle count, the AV contribution to the P&L is "pretty de minimis," and she does not expect that to change meaningfully in the near term, even as scale increases. Management is deliberately declining to detail unit economics at scale until the fleet grows, but both executives signaled comfort with the long-term economics of the model.
Growth Broad-Based, Not Driven by One-Time Catalysts
In response to questioning from Goldman Sachs' Eric Sheridan on the drivers behind rider growth, management pushed back on the idea that the quarter was inflated by transient factors like World Cup demand or promotional spend. Brewer pointed to strength across North America core rideshare, low-scale market expansion, an outperforming bikes segment hitting daily and weekly highs, and organic growth in Freenow even when lapping the acquisition. Risher added color on operational execution, noting Lyft's pickup times have improved 0.5% to 3% year-over-year depending on geography, and claimed Lyft now matches or beats its larger competitor on pickup speed 75% of the time despite operating with a smaller market share.
On the AV-versus-rideshare cannibalization debate, Risher pointed to 20% rides growth in San Francisco's autonomous operating design domain as validation of Lyft's long-held thesis that AVs expand the total addressable market rather than compete for existing demand. "This is one of the things we've been saying for a while. We're starting to see data that proves it quarter after quarter after quarter," he said, citing growth in both commute and leisure use cases, including a notable uptick in gym-related rides.
Partnership Ecosystem Approaching One-Third of Rides
Roughly 30% of North American rideshare rides are now linked to a partner, an all-time high that management said it intends to deepen rather than dilute by chasing new logos. Risher disclosed that riders have cumulatively redeemed 1.5 billion Bilt points on the platform and confirmed Alaska Airlines CEO Ben Minicucci has joined Lyft's board, underscoring the depth of that airline relationship. The Chase Sapphire Reserve partnership was relaunched roughly six months ago with enhanced 5x points and a $10 monthly credit, and Chase has since added a Southwest-branded benefit as well. Management characterized these partner-linked rides as skewing toward higher gross-bookings value, reinforcing the margin narrative, though the company gave no specific guidance on how much further partner penetration could climb.
Driver Supply Tightening in Lyft's Favor
Addressing concerns about driver supply keeping pace with accelerating demand, Risher provided several data points suggesting the labor side of the marketplace is healthy. Driver earnings per ride are up 8% year-over-year and tips are up 10%, both described as near all-time highs. He also cited a driver rewards program launched earlier this year that has paid out $14 million to date, much of it co-funded by partners, and pointed to a 30-percentage-point preference gap among drivers who work across both major platforms, with over 50% saying they prefer driving for Lyft versus a "much, much smaller" share favoring the competitor.
Margin Expansion Trajectory Intact, Freenow Rebrand Still Multi-Quarter Process
Brewer guided to sequential margin expansion in the third quarter, attributing the trend to market growth in low-scale geographies and Canada, continued cost discipline dating back to the company's Investor Day commitments, and mix shift toward higher-value modes including the chauffeuring and advertising businesses. On the 11-point gap between gross bookings growth and rides growth flagged by TD Cowen's John Blackledge, Brewer attributed it largely to seasonal mix, with the bikes business — which carries lower gross bookings per ride but strong unit economics — set to peak in the third quarter, while Freenow typically sees a lower-rides, higher-value mix during the European August holiday season.
On the Freenow rebrand, Risher offered on-the-ground detail from a recent trip to Europe, noting roughly a third of taxis in Barcelona now carry "Freenow by Lyft" livery, with similar rollouts underway in Dublin and Athens. However, full native integration allowing travelers to order a Lyft ride directly within the app across Europe remains targeted for 2027, and management does not expect the rebranding to have a material impact on the third-quarter guide. Pricing across the North American rideshare market was described as "relatively stable" through 2026, with no significant escalation in the competitive or promotional environment flagged by management despite direct questioning on the topic.