GM's Super Cruise Hits 1 Billion Miles in Hands-Free Driving

Nearly 750,000 drivers have collectively traveled a billion miles using GM's Super Cruise hands-free driving system, proving that safety-first technology can win hearts on the highway. The milestone shows something rare in tech: people actually want to keep using it.

When Super Cruise launched in the Cadillac CT6 in 2017, GM took a different approach than competitors. The system only works on highways that have been mapped with lidar technology, and an infrared camera watches drivers' eyes to make sure they're paying attention to the road.

That careful design paid off. About 40% of GM owners with Super Cruise renew their subscriptions after the first three years expire, according to Rashed Haq, GM's vice president of autonomous vehicles.

"It really shows how Super Cruise is passing what I call the toothbrush test," Haq explained. "Once they use it, they never go back."

The numbers back up that enthusiasm. Drivers use Super Cruise for an average of 24 minutes and 17 miles per trip. More than half of Super Cruise owners use it weekly or daily.

The system has grown dramatically since its early days. The mapped highway network expanded from 160,000 miles in 2018 to nearly 700,000 miles today across the US and Canada. Usage doubled year over year, with drivers logging 7.1 million hours and 485.9 million miles across 28.7 million trips in 2025 alone.

The Ripple Effect

GM's success proves that prioritizing safety doesn't mean sacrificing popularity. While competitors rush to deploy systems that work everywhere, Super Cruise's focused approach on highways where it works best has created devoted users who trust the technology enough to use it daily.

The company plans to expand Super Cruise even further. By 2028, the Cadillac Escalade IQ will debut an upgraded version that lets drivers take their eyes off the road on highways, advancing from a driver assist system to a more automated experience. The upgraded system is already being tested on public roads in multiple states.

What started as a feature in one luxury sedan has become a technology that drivers describe as essential to their daily routines, proof that the future of driving is arriving one carefully mapped mile at a time.