Uber’s annual Lost & Found Index has long offered a strange little window into what people leave behind in rides, from smartphones and laptops to live fish, an ankle monitor, a toboggan, a package of live butterflies and even a single Louboutin shoe. This year, the company is using the list to make a point about robotaxis: even without a driver, passengers still forget everything from the ordinary to the bizarre, including dentures, an “I Heart Hot Dads” bag and a blue hat reading “Emotional Support Human.”
A familiar problem, now in driverless cars
Uber said Tuesday that thousands of items were left in robotaxis on its ride-hailing network over the past year. That figure is smaller than the millions of forgotten items the company has logged across its regular ride service over the years, but it still signals that autonomous vehicles are already generating their own lost-and-found trail.
The list of items left behind in robotaxis includes the usual suspects: phones, keys, wallets, passports and headphones. But the inventory also veers into the offbeat, with items such as a set of dentures, the “I Heart Hot Dads” bag, a blue “Emotional Support Human” hat, a 15-pound yo-yo, one large black marble duck, a Squishmallow and a Charli XCX poster.
Uber’s lost-and-found habit meets AV ambitions
For Uber, the report is more than a quirky annual roundup. It also shows that the company’s ride network is already handling the operational side of driverless travel, including support for riders who leave things behind. That matters because Uber has spent years building partnerships with autonomous vehicle companies, and its robotaxi business is now beginning to scale in a meaningful way.
Commercial momentum picked up in March 2025, when the “Waymo on Uber” robotaxi service launched in Austin. Since then, Uber and Waymo have also launched a robotaxi service in Atlanta. Uber has also added other autonomous vehicle companies to its app over the past year, including Motional in Las Vegas and Avride in Dallas, though those services still have human safety operators behind the wheel.
In that context, thousands of lost items in a single year suggest a growing number of completed robotaxi trips on Uber’s platform. It also reinforces the practical reality that driverless rides still need systems for customer support, item recovery and depot operations.
How riders recover lost items from a robotaxi
Uber said the process for retrieving something left in a robotaxi is similar to the process for any other Uber trip. Riders open the app, go to the activity tab, select the trip during which the item was lost and contact customer support. From there, they can message, chat or call a support agent.
If the item is found, Uber offers two ways to get it back:
- Pay $15 for an Uber Courier driver to provide same-day local delivery
- Pick up the item in person from an AV depot, where the vehicles are stored and serviced
Uber Courier is a rebrand of Uber Connect, which launched in 2020 and let users send packages and personal items between local addresses. In this case, Uber is leaning on an existing delivery tool to support the new robotaxi workflow.
Building a support layer for autonomous rides
Uber says it is doing more than simply repurposing current products. In a statement, Amy Satrom, global head of autonomous support at Uber, said the company has spent the last decade building systems to help riders reunite with lost belongings.
“With tens of millions of lost items reported on Uber each year, we’ve spent the last decade building systems that help riders quickly and seamlessly reunite with their belongings,” Satrom said. “As autonomous rides continue to scale on Uber, we’re bringing that same expertise to AVs — combining our fleet operations, support teams, and hybrid network to make getting a lost item back simple, even when there’s no driver behind the wheel.”
That “hybrid network” language is important. Uber’s approach to autonomous mobility appears to depend on combining its existing ride-hailing scale, support infrastructure and logistics services rather than treating robotaxis as a wholly separate product.
Uber Autonomous Solutions and the push for revenue
In February, Uber announced Uber Autonomous Solutions, a new business division designed to reflect its broader ambitions around driverless technology. The division offers companies a suite of services that can support the operations of a robotaxi, self-driving truck or sidewalk delivery robot business, including software and support services.
The company’s goal is not simply to host autonomous rides in the app. Uber clearly wants AVs to become a meaningful part of its business. It plans to offer robotaxi rides through its app in as many as 15 cities globally by the end of the year, and it has said it intends to be the largest facilitator of AV trips in the world by 2029.
Why the lost items matter
At first glance, a list that includes dentures, a Squishmallow and an “I Heart Hot Dads” bag can read like little more than internet-friendly content. But the broader message is that robotaxis are moving from pilot novelty to routine transportation, and routine transportation creates routine customer-service challenges.
Uber’s lost-and-found system, which already handles tens of millions of reports each year, gives the company an operational advantage as it expands into autonomous rides. The same machinery that helps return passports, headphones and wallets in human-driven trips can now be used to support AV passengers as well.
That may not sound like a headline-making business line, but it is part of the infrastructure that helps autonomous rides scale. If Uber can make a forgotten item feel like a solved problem, it strengthens the case that its network can manage the less glamorous parts of driverless mobility too.
Source: Original report
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Last Modified: July 7, 2026 at 9:31 pm
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