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Philadelphia’s food delivery robots have been kicked, vandalized, blocked by pedestrians and even gotten a retired professor arrested. Now, despite the hate, they’re getting more work.
Avride, the company behind the autonomous Uber Eats robots roaming Center City sidewalks, announced Wednesday that it will expand its Philadelphia operations to include deliveries through the Grubhub app and Wonder food halls.
The expansion will allow customers ordering from participating restaurants on Grubhub to opt for robotic delivery, provided their destination falls within the company’s service area.
It’s part of a broader expansion that also includes Hoboken, New Jersey; Arlington County, Virginia, and a larger service area in Jersey City, where Avride and Grubhub began testing the technology last year.
The companies expect dozens of additional restaurants across the markets to participate, although the exact number in Philadelphia has not been disclosed. Neither has the number of additional robots being deployed, the neighborhoods they will serve or a specific launch date. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that Avride said the number of robots in Philadelphia will “evolve alongside the needs of the program.”
PennDOT estimated eight Avride delivery robots in Philly before their expansion in June. They’ve since reported that roughly a dozen are in the city at any time, with the number fluctuating based on day-to-day demand. An Avride blog post in May said that their robots make an average of 10 trips in a day.
Wonder, which acquired Grubhub in 2025, operates food halls that prepare dishes from multiple restaurant concepts under one roof. It has 16 Philadelphia locations, including spots in Fishtown, South Philly, University City and Rittenhouse.
“This expansion reflects our belief that the future of food delivery will be faster, smarter and increasingly powered by technology,” PJ Poykayil, Wonder’s executive vice president of customer delivery, said in a statement reported by PhillyVoice.
The four-wheeled AI-powered couriers first began delivering Uber Eats orders in Philadelphia on March 10, following roughly a year of testing.
Standing just under 3 feet tall, the robots have animated eyes, a small flag and a locked storage compartment that can hold up to 55 pounds of food. They navigate sidewalks at speeds of up to 5 miles per hour using cameras, radar and other sensors. If you’ve walked through Center City in the past seven months, more likely than not, a robot has rolled in front of you.
Customers can track their food’s journey through the Uber Eats app and unlock the robot’s compartment once it arrives. The bots cannot climb stairs or enter buildings, meaning customers have to meet them outside and remove their food from the robot’s compartment.
The initial rollout covered Center City, Chinatown and Old City, with deliveries generally traveling no more than 2 miles. Uber Eats said there was no additional charge or tipping requirement for robot delivery. Grubhub has not yet detailed whether the same pricing arrangements will apply to its Philadelphia expansion.
But almost immediately after the March rollout, Philadelphians began putting the new technology to the test.
Videos circulated showing residents sitting on, graffitiing and kicking the robots, drawing comparisons to hitchBOT, the Canadian hitchhiking robot famously destroyed in Philadelphia in 2015.
One robot was kicked over near Juniper and Locust streets in late March. The people responsible eventually returned it to its wheels.
Not all the problems involved people attacking robots.
In April, a woman reported that an autonomous delivery robot bumped into her from behind while she waited at 15th and Locust streets. Li Gordon-Washington suffered a scratch but said she struggled to determine which government agency should receive her complaint.
The most recent confrontation came just last week on Oct. 14, when Carolyn Marvin, a 78-year-old retired University of Pennsylvania communications professor, was arrested after refusing to move out of a delivery robot’s path. Marvin received a criminal violation notice for disorderly conduct as a result of her action, or maybe inaction.
“I oppose ruthless corporations casting aside human workers they don’t want to pay — in this case delivery folks at the bottom of the wage pile — to enrich their bottom line,” Marvin wrote in a statement to the Daily Pennsylvanian, Penn’s student newspaper. “These real people are workers with no defense against these corporations except our care for their situation.”
Marvin said she was protesting the potential displacement of human delivery workers by automated technology. She has repeatedly blocked robots during walks through the city and said she intends to challenge the citation on First Amendment grounds.
The machines have also faced questions from restaurant owners. In May, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that some Center City restaurants began receiving robot pickups despite their owners not remembering signing up for the service.
The new Grubhub expansion, by contrast, will allow participating restaurants to opt into robotic delivery.
Maybe a less confrontational response is Philadelphia’s Ministry of Awe’s quirky alternative to food delivery robots: “Orifice the Awebot,” a pink, remote-controlled creature with blond hair, blue eyes and a goofy dangling tongue designed to spread joy rather than deliver meals.
Setting the grounds for a sci-fi movie, under Pennsylvania law, delivery robots are technically pedestrians.
A 2020 state law classifies personal delivery devices alongside people walking or using mobility devices, allowing them to operate on sidewalks and crosswalks.
The machines must yield to pedestrians and cyclists. Although state law allows speeds of up to 12 mph in pedestrian areas and 25 mph on certain roads, Avride’s robots typically move at walking speed.
Companies must obtain authorization from PennDOT before operating. According to the agency’s public authorization list, Avride received approval for its second phase of Philadelphia operations on Sept. 23.
Philadelphia also requires companies to notify the city’s Streets Department at least 30 days before beginning operations and identify the areas where the devices will travel. City officials can prohibit their use in locations where they determine the machines pose a hazard.
Meanwhile, City Council is considering another potential obstacle to robot delivery.
A bill introduced by Councilmember Jeffery Young Jr. in May would establish new registration and reporting requirements for food delivery companies and impose a $1,000 fee on each delivery made by an autonomous unit using city sidewalks. The proposed surcharge per delivery would exceed the typical cost of the food itself and effectively price autonomous units out of the market.
The proposal remains in committee and has not become law.
For now, the robots appear poised to become an even more familiar sight on Philadelphia sidewalks.
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