Ride-sharing service Lyft has delivered its 1 billionth ride. That number more than doubles where the company was just a year ago. In October 2017, six years after its initial launch, Lyft had just surpassed 500 million rides.
The explosive growth is due in part to Lyft’s expansion into additional markets. Over the past year, the service has launched in 20 new markets, including Ottawa and Toronto, Canada. It’s also gearing up for an IPO next year.
Those 1 billion trips included 76 million rides to the airport and 500,000 visits to Disney World. The longest trip was a 639-mile journey from Denver, Colo., to Sioux City, Iowa, in 2016. About 31,000 rides were given by a single driver, and one rider has taken a whopping 9,000 rides using the service.
Despite all that growth, it’s still trailing behind its biggest rival, Uber. Uber surpassed that 1 billion mark in December of 2015 and announced it had surpassed 10 billion rides in July of this year. Uber also has a larger global footprint, and operates in 65 countries with stakes in 15 others, CNBC reports.
Lyft is steadily gaining market share but is still significantly behind Uber. Left currently holds 29% of the ride-sharing market to Uber’s 69%, reports CNBC.
Lyft has also recently expanded into other modes of transportation beyond just cars. It recently purchased bike-share company Motivate for around $250 million and will potentially offer options, such as bikes and scooters, in the app in the future. Uber is making similar moves and recently acquired bike-sharing company JUMP bikes.
