Self-driving truck startup PlusAI hits new safety milestones ahead of 2027 launch
Three key measures of readiness are all moving in the right direction, and the company says driverless commercial trucks are now a 2027 target, not a distant dream.
Key points
- PlusAI reported its commercial readiness figures for the first half of 2026, showing progress across all three safety metrics it tracks publicly.
- The company's safety case readiness score rose from 90.1% to 93.4% between late 2025 and mid-2026.
- PlusAI is aiming to deploy factory-built autonomous trucks at commercial scale in 2027.
- In the first half of 2026, PlusAI launched freight trials with International and Ryder on a Texas highway and announced the first autonomous trucks in Southern Europe.
- SuperDrive 6.0, the company's latest self-driving software, added night-driving and construction-zone handling.
A Santa Clara, California startup says its self-driving trucks are getting measurably closer to the road, and it has the numbers to back that up.
PlusAI, founded in 2016, builds software called SuperDrive that drives big commercial trucks without a human behind the wheel. Yesterday the company released its commercial readiness figures for the first half of 2026, as first reported by The Robot Report. The figures are meant to show, milestone by milestone, how close the technology is to being ready for everyday freight runs.
What do the numbers actually mean?
Three scores tell the story. Think of them as gauges on a dashboard, each one measuring a different piece of readiness.
| Metric | What it measures | Late 2025 | Mid-2026 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Safety Case Readiness (SCR) | Engineering evidence that the system is safe to deploy | 90.1% | 93.4% |
| Autonomous Miles Percentage (AMP) | Share of miles driven by the software, not a human | 99.2% | 99.8% |
| Remote Assistance-Free Trips (RAFT) | Trips completed without a remote operator stepping in | 79% | 85.2% |
PlusAI says it wants SCR at 100% and RAFT above 90% before trucks start delivering freight commercially. Both targets are set for 2027.
The AMP figure is particularly striking. At 99.8%, the software is steering for nearly every single mile driven during trials, leaving almost nothing for a human backup driver to do.
What has PlusAI actually been doing out on the road?
The numbers are backed by real-world activity. In the first half of 2026, PlusAI launched a commercial fleet trial with truck maker International and logistics company Ryder, running loads along Interstate 35 in Texas, one of the busiest freight corridors in the country.
It also announced the first autonomous trucks in Southern Europe, working with Spanish logistics firm Sesé and the regional government of Aragon in Spain.
On the software side, SuperDrive 6.0 arrived with two additions that matter for full commercial use: the ability to drive at night and to handle construction zones, two situations that have tripped up self-driving systems for years.
PlusAI also deepened a partnership with chip and computing company NVIDIA, using NVIDIA's Alpamayo foundation model, a large AI system trained to handle complex driving decisions, alongside NVIDIA's safety tools.
Should truckers and freight companies pay attention?
Yes, though 2027 is still a year and a half away, and these are still trial runs, not open-road freight.
The honest caveat is that self-driving timelines have slipped before, across the whole industry. PlusAI is making steady, documented progress, but the gap between 93% safety case readiness and 100% can hide a lot of hard engineering work.
For freight companies, the practical question is cost. Autonomous trucks promise lower per-mile operating costs once drivers are no longer needed, but the upfront integration costs are real and largely unpublished.
For truck drivers, a fully driverless commercial fleet is still a 2027-and-beyond story. Remote monitoring roles and fleet management jobs are likely to grow before driving roles shrink.
Takeaway: If you work in logistics or freight, start asking your suppliers and partners what their autonomous vehicle strategy looks like. The trucks are not here yet, but the companies buying them are making decisions now.
