Uber announced a new ride type that allows minors to take an Uber ride without being accompanied by an adult.
With UberX Teen, teens aged 13–17 can request a ride from their own Uber account after a parent or guardian adds them to a family profile.
Parents and guardians will get real-time ride updates and teens will have access to several safety features.
Prior to UberX Teen, unaccompanied minors were not allowed to use Uber under any circumstances.
If Uber for teens isn’t in available your city yet, teens and children are still prohibited from riding without an adult.
Uber drivers: You are free to decline requests from teens, and you should only allow minor riders if the ride is labeled as a teen request.
Read on to learn more about UberX Teen and how you can request an Uber for a teen.
UberX Teen: Rides for teens aged 13–17
With the UberX Teen, unaccompanied teens age 13–17 can request an Uber and ride alone after a parent or guardian adds them to a family profile.
This gives teens full flexibility to get a ride anywhere they need to go. Rides will be paid for with the parent or guardian’s payment method, so teens won’t need to handle any payment.
Parents and guardians can follow the ride with real-time location tracking and pickup/dropoff notifications.
Teens are allowed to bring other riders with them, but the other riders must be 13 or older.
Uber says that the other riders must have permission to ride from a parent or guardian, but they don’t say how the other teen riders can demonstrate that they have permission.
Safety features for parents and guardians: Live tracking, communicate with drivers
- Get notifications when a ride is requested, then pickup/dropoff notifications
- Real time ride tracking: See where the car is at all times
- Contact and communicate with the driver from the Uber app
- Remove the payment method if you want to block further rides
- Remove the teen account to end their ride privileges
Safety features for teen riders
- Each ride uses PIN verification and RideCheck
- Easy access to the Uber safety line or 911
- Teens have the option to enable in-ride audio recording
PIN verification and RideCheck are enabled by default and can’t be turned off, but in-ride audio recording is an optional. Only teens can setup audio recording—parents can’t turn it on from their parent/guardian profile.
Note that drivers can also turn on audio recording, and teens will be notified if a driver has recording set up.
How to add a teen to your family profile
Add your child to your family profile by going to Account > Settings > Family > Add member > Teen
Select your teen from your contacts and they will receive an SMS invite that will allow them to create a teen account in their own Uber app.
Setting up a teen account
Teens can create their own Uber account after receiving a text invite from a parent or guardian.
Teens must do a mandatory safety training that teaches them how to use the app, the special features of the teen account, and how they can use built-in safety features to stay safe.
Where is UberX Teen available?
UberX Teen is currently available in these cities:
- Atlanta, Georgia
- Bloomington, Indiana
- Cincinnati, Ohio
- Columbus, Ohio
- Dallas, Texas
- Dayton, Ohio
- Houston, Texas
- Kansas City, Missouri
- Minneapolis, Minnesota
- Nashville, Tennessee
- New York City + suburbs, New York
- Phoenix, Arizona
- San Antonio, Texas
- Tucson, Arizona
UberX Teen not available? Unaccompanied minors can’t request rides or ride alone!
Unaccompanied minors can only use Uber via an approved teen profile in an eligible city.
So in any areas that doesn’t have UberX Teen or teen profiles, riders under 18 can’t use Uber alone.
Minors can’t request rides, and minors can’t ride alone in an Uber even if a parent or guardian says that they requested the ride.
Drivers can cancel a ride if they believe the rider is an unaccompanied minor.
More help for Uber users
- The best ways to contact Uber customer service
- How much does Uber cost?
- What’s the difference between the Uber ride types?
For Uber drivers: How UberX Teen works
Drivers: Get ready for teen riders
You may begin to see ride requests with a ‘teen’ label. The passenger will be a minor aged 13–17 who was authorized by a parent or guardian to ride alone.
You are free to decline the requests, but it’s not clear if you can block all teen ride requests in your ride preferences.
Pay for UberX Teen rides is the same as UberX. There is no additional pay.
Parents will be able to track the ride in their own Uber app, and they will be able to contact you. If you get a call during a ride with a teen driver, it is probably from a parent.
Teens with approved teen accounts can bring other teens along with them as long as they are 13 or older.
Uber says that other teen riders must have permission to ride, but there is no in-app feature or other mechanism to prove that the other teen riders have permission.
Protect yourself with the audio recording option
For your own safety and the safety of your riders, you can enable audio recording in the driver app settings.
The Uber driver app will record and store audio during your rides, and Uber support will be able to access the audio files.
Riders are notified when you enable audio recording.
Unaccompanied minors outside of UberX Teen are still prohibited
Solo teen riders are only permitted to ride if their account was created using the teen profile system.
If a rider looks underage and the request is not labeled as a teen rider, you can cancel the trip and select ‘unaccompanied minor’ as the reason.
See the full UberX Teen announcement for drivers
Emmy M Harrison says
I’m not giving rides to teens. It’s there parents responsibility to get their child where they need to go not mine. I’m not a babysitter I will opt out or decline the ride everytime. Teenagers are nasty with their attitudes and not always the neatest people. What are you supposed to do when they become hostile you can’t kick them out on the side of the road. Then your gonna get these parents who think you work for them cause they are paying you. That’s not how it works.
Penney says
I am not riding teenagers..filthy mouths…attitudes…I will opt out every time.