Uber Parking launches in Philadelphia
The launch comes months after the company acquired the parking-reservation app SpotHero for about $600 million.
Uber customers in Philadelphia can now reserve a parking spot on the popular rideshare app.
Uber Parking launched this week, months after the company acquired the parking-reservation app SpotHero for about $600 million, according to SEC filings.
“We’ve built Uber around giving people more ways to get around without needing a car,” Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said in a statement earlier this year. “But for the moments when people do choose to drive, SpotHero on the Uber app will make the experience easier than ever, and bring more people into the Uber ecosystem.”
Uber Parking marks the latest addition to Uber’s growing portfolio of services, which includes food, grocery, and package delivery. This spring, Uber became the 12th U.S. city to get Uber Eats delivery robots, the white cuboids often seen chugging down Center City streets.
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Philly is among 15 U.S. cities where Uber is launching the parking feature, according to several national news outlets. The others include Boston, New York, and Washington, D.C.
In a news release Monday, Uber said its users will eventually be able to book parking spots across SpotHero’s full network of 13,000 garages, lots, and valets in 400 cities in the U.S. and Canada.
Uber Parking works much like the SpotHero app, which continues to operate as “SpotHero by Uber.”
As of Thursday afternoon, Uber customers could reserve spots at about 100 lots and garages in Philadelphia. To access the parking feature, it appeared users must be in the city or have their location set to a Philadelphia address for the blue parking icon to appear under the “For You” section on the app homepage.
As on SpotHero, Uber customers can select the date, time, and location where they need parking; compare options and pricing on an interactive map; and filter those choices for valet, self-parking, or other criteria. Once they make a selection, users insert vehicle information and pay on the app, then scan a digital QR-code parking pass when they arrive at the lot. Some lots even use license plate recognition, no scanning required.
If your outing goes long, parking sessions can be extended in the app.
Uber spokespeople did not return requests for comment about the Philly rollout.
Uber’s revenue has grown in recent years, according to earnings reports, as have its gross bookings, a metric the company defines as the dollar value of all rideshare trips and delivery orders. The company, which went public in 2019, has been profitable every year since 2023, according to the reports, and posted net income of more than $10 billion last year.
As the company has expanded, some drivers and riders have reported negative experiences and expressed serious safety concerns.
Last year, several drivers told The Inquirer their pay had decreased amid a drop-off in “surge” pricing, and a “black box” of an algorithm that seems to favor some drivers over others. And several customers said they had found it increasingly difficult to get rides, especially in high-traffic areas like the South Philly stadium complex.
But rideshare is only a piece of Uber’s business, and in recent months Uber’s delivery services have almost caught up to it in terms of revenue. Rideshare accounted for $7.5 billion, according to the company’s most recent quarterly report, while its food-delivery and freight services brought in $7.2 billion.
