To understand where all the various advances fall, it is useful to look at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) classification of five levels of autonomy: Level 0 does not include any support for automation; Level 1 includes tools for additional feedback to the human driver, for example using a rear camera; Level 2 includes localized active control, for example antilock brakes; Level 3 includes support for select autonomy but the human must be ready to take over (as in the Tesla Autopilot); Level 4 includes autonomy in some places some of the time; and Level 5 is autonomy in all environments all the time.
There is a lot of activity in this space across a big spectrum of car capabilities. To understand where all the various advances fall, it is useful to look at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) classification of five levels of autonomy: Level 0 does not include any support for automation; Level 1 includes tools for additional feedback to the human driver, for example using a rear camera; Level 2 includes localized active control, for example antilock brakes; Level 3 includes support for select autonomy but the human must be ready to take over (as in the Tesla Autopilot); Level 4 includes autonomy in some places some of the time; and Level 5 is autonomy in all environments all the time.