Lyft

Is Lyft safe to use?

For rides, Lyft is about as safe as Uber, and its data record is better. We found no large breach of Lyft accounts and no privacy fine, and the app now lets you share your trip, check a PIN before the ride starts and record audio and video inside the car. The weak spots are advertising and openness. Lyft's App Store label lists more data used to track you than Uber's, and the only safety report it has published covers 2017 to 2019. We score it 52/100.

How common are assaults on Lyft rides?

Lyft's first and so far only Community Safety Report, released in October 2021, counted 4,158 reports of sexual assault on US rides in 2017, 2018 and 2019. Of those, 360 were reports of rape. The report also counted 10 deaths from physical assaults over the three years. Riders made 52% of the sexual assault reports and drivers 38%, which is a reminder that drivers face risk too.

Those numbers are small against hundreds of millions of rides a year, and Lyft, like Uber, said 99.9% of rides in the report period had no reported safety incident. They are also old. Uber has published data up to 2020; Lyft has published nothing newer that we could find, so nobody outside the company knows the current rate.

Courts are now the other source of information. Claims by passengers who say drivers assaulted them have been grouped in a coordinated proceeding in San Francisco since January 2020. In February 2026 a federal panel created a multidistrict litigation in the Northern District of California for similar cases filed across the country, Lyft's quarterly filing says. These are allegations, and no verdict in the federal case has been reported yet.

What Lyft's app collects

The Lyft app is published by Lyft, Inc. and rated 4+. Its Apple privacy label is long. Under "Data Used to Track You" it lists purchases, financial info, location, contact info, identifiers and usage data, which means data can be linked with what other companies hold about you for advertising. Purchase history, payment info, coarse location, name, email, phone number and device IDs are linked to you for third-party advertising. Precise location is used for analytics and to run the service, and photos, videos and audio are collected when you use features such as ride recording.

Lyft's privacy policy, updated on 1 July 2026, says it does not sell personal information to third parties for money and does not act as a data broker. In the same document it says some disclosures to ad partners may count as "sharing" or a "sale" for targeted advertising under some US state laws. That is the honest reading: Lyft does not sell lists of riders, but it does use your trips and purchases to target ads on and off the app.

Security and the FTC case

We found no large breach of Lyft rider data, which is unusual for a company of its size and the main reason it scores higher than Uber on security. Lyft hides phone numbers when riders and drivers call or message each other. Its quarterly filing says unauthorised parties have gained access to its systems or those of its providers in the past, without naming any material incident.

Lyft's regulatory record has one item that matters. On 25 October 2024 the FTC and the Justice Department settled a case alleging Lyft misled drivers about pay. Ads promised up to $43 an hour in Los Angeles, a figure the FTC said reflected the top fifth of drivers and included tips. Earnings guarantees, such as $975 for 45 weekend rides, paid only the difference between a driver's actual earnings and the guarantee. Lyft agreed to a $2.1 million civil penalty and to base future pay claims on typical earnings. The Commission voted 3 to 2. The case concerns drivers, not riders' data.

Lyft bought Freenow, a European taxi app, in July 2025. Freenow is a separate app with its own record, and this page covers only the Lyft app.

How to ride Lyft more safely

1. Match the plate, car and driver photo before you get in, and ask the driver who they are picking up rather than giving your name.
2. Turn on PIN Verification in the app's safety settings, so the ride cannot start until the driver enters your code.
3. Add trusted contacts who can follow your trip live, and share every late-night ride.
4. Set Ride Recording to run on night rides or all rides. Recordings stay private and are only reviewed if you send them to Lyft's safety team.
5. Use the in-app emergency button, which connects to ADT agents who can pass your location and car details to the police.
6. On iPhone, tap "Ask App Not to Track", and use the privacy choices link on Lyft's site to opt out of targeted advertising.

How we scored it

Regulatory record (65) is Lyft's strongest factor: one $2.1 million FTC penalty about driver pay, a mid-sized fine, and no privacy fine. Privacy (36) is the weakest, because the label lists financial info and location among data used to track you. Scams and harmful content (50) reflects the assault reports and the pending litigation against a large number of rides. For ride-hailing in Europe, compare Bolt, which tracks less but has published no safety data at all.