Uber introduced a “Women’s Preferences” on Wednesday that will enable girls riders and drivers within the US to solely be linked with different girls for his or her journeys by way of the ride-sharing service.
The pilot program will start within the subsequent few weeks in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Detroit.
The corporate doesn’t but have a launch date for different US cities.
“Across the US, women riders and drivers have told us they want the option to be matched with other women on trips,” the corporate stated in a press launch. “We’ve heard them—and now we’re introducing new ways to give them even more control over how they ride and drive.”
“For the first time in the US, we’re launching Women Preferences—features designed to give women riders and drivers more choice, more confidence, and more flexibility when they use Uber,” the corporate added.
The brand new function comes as Uber has recorded 1000’s of incidents of sexual assaults over time and has sought to introduce measures to make touring safer.
The corporate beforehand launched the ladies rider choice function in different international locations, permitting girls in round 40 international locations to request feminine riders.
This system first launched in Saudi Arabia in 2019 after a regulation handed that granted girls the best to drive, and it subsequently expanded after receiving an “overwhelmingly positive” response.
“Of course, riders wanted the same choice,” Uber stated. “But making this work reliably—not just symbolically—required thoughtful design. Most drivers are men, so we’ve worked to ensure this feature was truly usable in different places around the world. We tested, listened, and refined it in markets like Germany and France, adapting the feature to real-world rider and driver behaviors. As a result, in a first for the industry, we’re able to launch more reliable features that offer women riders multiple ways to be matched with a woman driver.”
Ladies riders should confirm their very own gender on the app to entry the brand new function.
When deciding on a experience, they’ll see “Women Drivers” as an on-demand choice together with present choices similar to UberXL, Uber Black, Consolation and Wait & Save.
Riders may reserve journeys prematurely with girls drivers.
Moreover, girls drivers could have the choice to request journeys with girls riders.
Though it isn’t assured, the corporate stated riders and drivers can toggle on the ladies choice of their app settings to extend the probabilities of being matched with one other lady.
Lyft, one other ride-share service, launched the “Women+ Connect” choice —much like Uber’s new program — in September 2023 earlier than it expanded nationwide in February 2024.
