Lyft is one of the popular ride-hailing apps here in the US, although they do play second fiddle to Uber these days. Lyft isn’t sitting back and letting Uber have all of the fun though. Lyft just rolled out a new feature to their service that is actually pretty impressive. Have you ever needed to hitch a ride, but don’t have the Lyft app installed, or more likely, don’t have enough room on your smartphone to install the app? Well that’s no longer an issue, as you can head to their website on your favorite browser and request a ride from there.
The process is quite simple, just head to Lyft’s website, which it should automatically take you to m.lyft.com, and then you’ll enter your phone number. The website will send you a text message to verify, and then you’ll just need to give it access to your current location, and you’re all set. You’ll be free to request a ride like you normally would with Lyft. The company will still have all of your payment information on file and at the ready, so all you need to do is enter your destination and/or get a fare estimate. It’s quite simple.
Early users of the website noted that there was no way to logout of the mobile web experience. Lyft announced that they are working on a log out feature and that should be live before the end of the day. It’s actually live already, so it’s great to see them being pretty quick about adding that feature into the service.
This new feature definitely puts them ahead of Uber right now, as you do still need to use the Uber app to hail a ride. Lyft is still a somewhat smaller ride-hailing service, compared to Uber, but that should change as they get more and more drivers, as well as more passengers using the service. Lyft is mostly only available in the US right now, but they are quickly expanding and with General Motors as an investor, they will likely be giving Uber a run for their money pretty soon.