The catch is the cost of parking: they weren’t hard to find here in DC but if you’re seeing lots of available cars nearby that means they’re paying a fair amount for all of that unused capacity. The Uber/Lyft model shifts that cost to the drivers so it looks cheaper as long as you don’t factor in congestion.
Availability barely matters though. When I need a ride I open Lyft, see if they have a car nearby, and if the answer is no, I switch to Uber. The switching cost is so low it's negligible.
I live in NYC and Uber / Lyft are sometimes cheaper and sometimes more expensive. Their premium is correlated with how hard it'll be to catch a cab. So if it's raining, it'll be hard to catch a cab. Uber / Lyft will be more expensive than a cab, but easier to take.
UberPool and Lyft's equivalent are basically always cheaper though, and I've found they work very well in Manhattan.
I think it depends on the market. Lyft here (Philadelphia) is the same price as Uber just about, and they both run promotions all the time. Car availability is the same in my experience and most drivers seem to do both. Drivers seem to indicate that they get better subsidies to drive from Lyft.
Anecdotally, in DC the typical wait time for my Lyft rides has about doubled over the past year. Since I can't imagine why fewer people would be driving for them, I interpret that as evidence of increased demand for Lyft.
I've recently tried Lyft - at airports and downtown areas it's fine (10-15% cheaper than Uber), but in some more suburban areas the wait times (compared to Uber) make it unusable.
Additionally, in smaller American markets, Uber is simply where the drivers are. Lyft's are almost always 15 minutes away, and because of that, they will always have surge pricing where Uber might not.
Oddly enough, when I compare Uber to Lyft in the East Bay, 99% of the time Lyft is cheaper by at least $3. Even Uber Pool is usually the same or slightly more expensive than a dedicated Lyft.
I have no idea why (maybe less drivers?) but I already stopped using Uber because of that. If their prices when even higher then I'd simply never use them again instead of the occasional time that I do now.
Eh, it depends on how you look at it. If you are comparing Lyft/Uber to public transit, yeah they lose out by a lot, but I don't think a lot of people are doing that. I think a lot of people are comparing Lyft/Uber against the cost of owning a semi-new car in a major city and that's much more comparable.
Here's a super ball park monthly cost breakdown:
- Car payment: $250
- Parking: $200
- Insurance: $85 (~$500 every 6 months)
- Gas: $50
- Registration: $40 (~$500+ a year)
- Saving for maintenance: $50 (assuming $600 a year, which is probably low)
That's super super napkin math, but that's almost $700 a month for a car, which is basically the same as $30 each work day for a month. On top of that, you don't have to deal with the hassle of parking in a city, which has to be worth something.
I use lyft more than uber these days. Its typically cheaper especially at the airport for some reason. If you want competition make sure you're using the competition.
I can see some of these stats in action. Where I live (Bay Area) Lyft is always more expensive (I typically check them both), sometimes by a lot. While in Manhattan I find Lyft cheaper about a third of the time. So no surprise I take more uber rides.
I have more incentive to stick with Uber now I’ve read this as the drivers make more (and typically the same driver does both anyway)
Very interesting. My experience with Lyft in Seattle has been far better than my experiences with Uber/UberX. I've yet to have an Uber driver be nearly as nice and friendly as a Lyft driver. I do think the price can be lower on Uber sometimes though. Also Uber cars seem to be available more often. I still try Lyft first though.
I don't think people are typically making a spreadsheet and plotting out whether or not this is really cheaper or more expensive. What's happening is either:
a) They don't have a car (or a second car) currently, they spend $X/mo on Uber, and they don't think that they could get a car they'd want to drive and/or park and/or deal with for that same amount of money.
OR
b) They know that they have a car sitting in their driveway / street / etc. and they're currently spending $X per month on it to mostly sit there idle, and they're pretty sure that they'd save money not using it, so they try a month of just Uber and sure enough, it cost them less than the idling car (or they just liked it better, whatever).
People think a lot about yuppies in the city as the Uber crowd, but in my experience Uber / Lyft is far more impactful on families. Instead of needing 1 car per adult to function, you may need only 1 car per household, or maybe 2 cars for a family with kids in high school (as compared to what we used to call the "used car lot" in front of all the High School kids houses back when I was growing up in the burbs).
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