Apple officially cancels autonomous driving permit as Tesla unveils Cybercab

Apple has officially contacted the California DMV to request cancelation of its Autonomous Vehicles Program Manufacturer’s Testing Permit, effective September 27th. Their permit would’ve been active until April 30th, 2025 if they hadn’t requested a cancelation (via macReports).

Permit cancelation

This news comes around 8 months after Apple officially canceled their Apple Car project internally. This is probably one of the bigger external signs that the project is canceled, given the fact that the permit directly relates to the project. There were also public WARN notices filed, which the company is required to do when they’re about to lay off a larger number of employees.

Apple requested the cancelation of their permit on September 25th, and the permit was officially canceled on September 27th, just weeks before Tesla unveiled its vision for a fully autonomous vehicle, with no steering wheel or pedals.

Apple Car plans

Previously, Apple was widely expected to be developing an autonomous electric vehicle of some sort, known internally as Project Titan. Initially the company intended to ship a vehicle with no steering wheel or pedals, although the company scaled back those ambitions in later years, before the official cancelation early this year. The vehicle was expected to cost over $100,000, and ship in 2028.

Tesla Cybercab

Just a few days ago, Tesla unveiled their own fully autonomous vehicle, called the Cybercab (or sometimes Robotaxi). Although it won’t ship until “before 2027”, it is a glimpse into the future of autonomous driving. I personally have my doubts about Tesla being able to sell these vehicles to consumers that quickly given the regulatory hurdles, but the vehicle design is fascinating.

Wrap up

I do wish that Apple would’ve made their own car still, as that would’ve been a far more interesting new product category than Apple Vision Pro in my opinion, but it would’ve been a challenge regardless. How would Apple service vehicles? How would these even get manufactured? There were lots of questions left unanswered with the Apple Car.

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