On 2 August 2026, SonntagsZeitung reported on a robotaxi ride taken by Federal President Guy Parmelin during a trip to North America, and on efforts by National Councillor Franz Grüter to bring the operator, Waymo, to Switzerland. The article also quotes the Federal Roads Office (ASTRA), which states that it has so far received no information from the company about its plans.
The report raises a question it does not answer. What would be required for a driverless commercial service to operate in Switzerland? The following sets out the current state of the framework.
A framework in force, not yet used
The Ordinance on Automated Driving (VAF) has been in force since 1 March 2025. It rests on articles 25a to 25g of the Road Traffic Act, which give the Federal Council the competence to authorise specific use cases at automation levels 3 and 4.
The ordinance covers three cases:
- On motorways, the driver of an approved vehicle may release the steering wheel and is no longer required to monitor traffic continuously, while remaining able to take over when the system requests it.
- Driverless vehicles may operate within operating areas approved by the cantons, under the supervision of an operator.
- Automated parking is permitted without a driver present, inside car parks designated and signposted for that purpose.
A commercial robotaxi service falls under the second case. To date, no operating area has been approved under the VAF.
Every automated mobility project currently running in Switzerland therefore operates under the pilot projects framework.
That includes the most advanced ones. Operations in which no one sits behind the wheel are already running in Switzerland, notably deliveries by LOXO and Planzer in Bern and the airside shuttle at Zurich Airport. Details of their operating conditions and authorisations are a matter for the project holders.
Who approves, and on what basis
Two separate approvals are required. The automation system of the vehicle needs type approval. Separately, the operating area needs to be approved. Type approval comprises the automation stack and the vehicle hardware as well as the operational design domain (ODD), which means the vehicle capabilities on a given environment.
Competence lies with the canton in which the vehicle is to be registered. That canton must define the Target Operational Domain (TOD) and evaluate the AV under it. The canton examines and coordinates the application, designates the authority & department responsible, and issues the decision. Where the operating area extends onto national roads such as motorways, ASTRA must consent. Where it extends into another canton, that canton must consent. All communes crossed are heard, as is the Federal Office of Transport if the operation is related to public passenger transport services.
ASTRA issued directives on this procedure on 19 December 2025, in force since 1 January 2026 (Weisungen führerlose Fahrzeuge, WFF). They describe the procedure and include an assessment instrument intended to keep the examination workload within limits.
The directives are not legally binding. Cantonal authorities decide whether and to what extent to apply them, and cantonal procedural and organisational law governs. The directives themselves note that assessing local circumstances leaves considerable discretion, and that significant differences between cantons may result. Grounds for refusal on that basis may include unwanted additional traffic, disproportionate strain on stopping and parking infrastructure, or an operating area that conflicts with a canton’s transport planning objectives.
This is where the Swiss framework differs most clearly from the American model described in the article. Approval attaches to a defined operating area and to a supervised operation, not to an open service area. A service covering a city would require approval of the area it operates in, with the consent of the canton and every other authority whose territory or roads it touches.
The deadline of 1 March 2028
The ordinance includes a transitional provision. For three years after entry into force, applicants have no entitlement to have an application for an operating area assessed (article 51 VAF). Cantons may grant such an entitlement earlier under cantonal law, but are not required to.
From 1 March 2028, all cantons must have regulated competences, designated their approval authorities, and must assess any applications received.
Until then, the directives recommend that applicants clarify in advance whether the authority concerned is willing and able to process an application at all.
The wider project portfolio
More than 40 automated vehicles have operated on Swiss territory since 2015. SAAM maintains the overview on all projects in Switzerland, with currently split between 16 ongoing & planned projects and 16 completed.
In passenger transport, ongoing projects include the Furttal automated mobility pilot initiated by the canton of Zurich, the Self-Controlled City Liner in Arbon and ULTIMO in Geneva. PostAuto is testing AmiGo, an on-demand automated ride-pooling service in eastern Switzerland, with a first opening to the public planned for early 2027.
In freight and logistics, alongside the LOXO and Planzer micro-hub, Embotech runs several automated vehicle handling applications and driverless dumper trucks are in use at a quarry in Aargau.
The full portfolio, with the status and initiator of each project, is available at saam.swiss/projects.
On the figure of around 100 vehicles
The figure quoted in the article comes from the SAAM Roadmap 2026-2040, published in May 2026 at the Automated Mobility Summit. It is not a forecast of market demand. It sets out the development steps the association considers necessary for automated mobility to establish itself in Switzerland.
For the Foundation phase, running to 2030, the Roadmap sets out approximately 50 robotaxis, 20 on-demand buses and 10 public transport buses in passenger transport, with the business case confirmed through pilot projects, and at least 15 vehicles validating the logistics business case in freight. In private transport, it anticipates the first automated vehicles with type approval on Swiss motorways.
This amounts to around 95 vehicles. The figure counts vehicles across the project portfolio, including projects that have since concluded. It is not a count of vehicles simultaneously in service on a given date.
The subsequent phases set substantially higher volumes: around 3,000 passenger vehicles by 2035 and around 23,000 by 2040. The Foundation phase figure is an order of magnitude for a period in which the objective is validation, not commercial scale.
What remains open is not primarily the law
ASTRA states that legal adjustments would be necessary only selectively, if at all. The framework exists, the implementing directives exist, and an assessment instrument is available.
What has not yet happened is its use. No vehicles are type approved and no cantons have yet defined a TOD. The first cases will establish how the criteria are applied in practice, how long the procedure takes, and how far cantonal assessments diverge.
From 1 March 2028, cantons must be in a position to assess applications. That is a new and technical competence for 26 administrations, and the ordinance’s own support mechanism, a federal advisory group composed of registration, police, construction, planning and environmental authorities, indicates that it was not assumed to be readily available.
The scale of a service is a second constraint. A commercial driverless service depends on fleet size, the extent of the approved operating area, ride volume, and the depot and remote supervision infrastructure required to support it. Waymo reports more than 500,000 rides per week across eleven American cities. Swiss urban areas are smaller on each of these parameters, and dense urban corridors are already served by public transport.
Franz Grüter identifies rural public transport, two thirds of which he describes as unprofitable, as an area where automated services could contribute. That is a different operating case from the dense urban deployments currently in commercial service abroad, and it has not been demonstrated at scale anywhere.
The question raised by the SonntagsZeitung article is therefore less whether an operator may come to Switzerland than whether the authorities competent to approve its operating area will be equipped to assess the application. Supporting cantons in building that capacity is one of SAAM’s current priorities.
SAAM takes no position on the entry of any individual operator into the Swiss market.
Follow us on LinkedIn to stay up-to-date with SAAM news!
