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Domino's pizzas now delivered with autonomous cars in Houston

Thanks to a new partnership with Nuro, customers can request a robocar delivery.

Sean Szymkowski
It all started with Gran Turismo. From those early PlayStation days, Sean was drawn to anything with four wheels. Prior to joining the Roadshow team, he was a freelance contributor for Motor Authority, The Car Connection and Green Car Reports. As for what's in the garage, Sean owns a 2016 Chevrolet SS, and yes, it has Holden badges.
Sean Szymkowski
2 min read
Nuro/Domino's pizza delivery

The future is now.

Domino's

Other companies may soak up more of the limelight, but Nuro's been a quiet, busy bee. In fact, Nuro's R2 self-driving car is the only vehicle to receive an exemption from the US Department of Transportation to operate despite having no human controls. Now, this robo pod is getting in on the pizza delivery business.

Domino's and Nuro announced Monday that the latter's autonomous car will report for pizza delivery duty this week. It's only for customers in the vicinity of a single pizza shop in the Houston area, but still -- this is wild. On certain days and in blocked-out periods of time, customers can request their pizza for delivery via a Nuro R2 if they place a prepaid order online. Domino's will select a customer at random to carry out the delivery order, and the customer will receive text message notifications saying where the little robocar is. They'll also get a PIN that'll let them access their order when it arrives. No pizza thievery allowed, guys.

Nuro/Domino's pizza delivery

Enter the PIN and grab your grub.

Domino's

Once the R2 pulls up to the destination, the customer enters the PIN on the touchscreen and the doors retract to reveal the food inside.

Nuro actually announced this program all the way back in 2019 and said it planned to work with Domino's to use its latest R2 self-driving car. Back then, it was still working with what it called the R1. With the R2 roadworthy in the US these days, the program's ready to roll. Nuro also partnered with Kroger to deliver groceries from select stores in Arizona in the past, so it's got experience.

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