Aurora Driver on Peterbilt 579 (PACCAR) vs Bot Auto Autonomous Truck vs Kodiak RoboTruck in 2026

Aurora Driver on Peterbilt 579 (PACCAR)

Aurora's driverless commercial freight runs the Aurora Driver (L4) on PACCAR trucks (Peterbilt 579 and Kenworth T680), hauling paid commercial freight on Texas lanes since May 2025. There is no consumer price: this is B2B autonomous freight, not a consumer product. The verified-vs-claimed nuance: the trucks are genuinely driverless (the Aurora Driver operates the vehicle), but Aurora reinstated an OEM-requested in-cab observer at PACCAR's request in May 2025: the observer is not a safety driver. Recorded at commercial maturity on verified paid-freight operations.

Bot Auto Autonomous Truck

Bot Auto's autonomous Class 8 truck is a Freightliner Cascadia retrofitted with sensors and redundant systems, operated by Bot Auto as its own motor carrier. It ran what is reported as America's first fully humanless commercial over-the-road truckload (Houston to Dallas) in April 2026, which places it at the most driver-out end of the autonomous-trucking verification spectrum: no human in the cab on a commercial run.

There is no consumer price: this is B2B autonomous freight. Recorded at commercial maturity on the verified humanless commercial run; Bot Auto is an early-stage company (Houston, founded by an ex-TuSimple founder) still raising growth capital.

Kodiak RoboTruck

Kodiak's RoboTruck runs the Kodiak Driver (L4) on a Peterbilt/PACCAR Class 8 base (a driverless electric Class 8 variant was introduced in 2023). It operates driverless commercially in the Permian Basin oilfield and is the platform for an on-highway long-haul product targeted for the second half of 2026.

There is no consumer price: this is B2B autonomous freight. The verified-vs-claimed nuance: the commercial driverless operation is real but currently domain-specific (oilfield routes); the on-highway long-haul commercialization is a target, not yet a verified deployment. Recorded at commercial maturity.