'Big Brother' Uber knows what Indians are up to abroad!

Maybe it was the Porsche Cayenne. Or the opportunity to take a train ride using an app. Whatever, Indians are hailing rides all over the world — and big brother Uber is taking note and crunching the data.

The American taxi aggregator shared its data of Indians using the app for hailing taxis (and more) in foreign countries to come up with the finding that not only was there a sharp increase in the number of Indians travelling abroad, but they were also only second to Americans in numbers. According to Uber, nearly 10 lakh Indians used their Uber app to hail a cab in foreign countries last year.

In fact, based on past data analysis and projections, Uber India said the number of Indians travelling abroad has seen a marked jump over the past couple of years, and once this ongoing summer is over, Indians are set to surpass previous records.

“It’s heartwarming to see how Uber continues to be…trusted last-mile partner in these travels. Be it the familiarity when landing at an airport in a new city, or the safety when riding late at night, it is a huge mark of trust for us to see Indians book an Uber for their overseas travels,” said Prabhjeet Singh, president of Uber India.

Indians used their Uber in nearly 1,000 cities across 68 countries last year, with the majority of them being in the US, the UK, and Canada. Interestingly, Indians travelled 25 per cent longer distances in Ubers abroad compared to their trips in India. And yes, of course, they tried as many as 21 different options, ranging from electric vehicles to multimodal transits.

In countries with peer-to-peer ride-sharing facilities (meaning personal vehicles are legally allowed to ply as taxis), Indians didn’t miss the chance to try a range of luxury vehicles. This ranged from the Porsche Cayenne to the Mercedes S450 as well as premium EVs like Jaguar I PACE and Audi e-tron Sportback.