The Department of Transportation has approved a request from the driverless vehicle company Zoox to start offering rides to paying customers. A California-based company owned by Amazon, Zoox has been testing its driverless electric vehicle with free rides. Now, it has approval to commercially deploy up to 5,000 vehicles over the next two years, starting in Las Vegas. Unlike Google’s Waymo, which adds driverless technology to existing vehicles, Zoox’s vehicles look like a box on wheels and don’t have steering wheels or pedals. Find “NPR News Now” wherever you listen to podcasts. Host: Jeanine Herbst/NPR Reporter: Camila Domonoske/NPR Producer: Michael Zamora/NPR

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