Business Traverlers' Appetite for Uber And Lyft Continues to Grow

Taking Uber and Lyft rides for business is showing no signs of slowing down.

After surpassing car rentals as the most used ground transportation method by business travelers in late 2015, ride-hailing services like Uber and Lyft now make up almost half of all rides, according to the latest report from business expense software company Certify.

Over the past year, ride-hailing has almost doubled its share of ground transportation to 46 percent of all rides. Only two years ago, it made up just 8 percent of business transportation, according to Certify.

Ride-hailing dominates business ground transportation even more when not counting car rentals, which typically serve a different type of traveler than the average short trip to a business meeting. By that measure, Uber rides made up 69 percent of all trips in March, with Lyft at 4 percent, and taxis at 27 percent.

Although it's still getting only a sliver of the business travel, Lyft's marketshare is growing. During the last quarter of 2015, it represented only 1 percent of all ride-hailing transactions, according to Certify, but jumped to 2.5 percent of all ground transportation in the first three months of 2016.

And with the recent addition by Lyft of business profiles on to help passengers more easily keep their business and personal trips separate, that share may continue to grow. Last fall, Lyft introduced the ability for passengers to link their app to their account with Concur, another expense management software provider.

Uber has been rolling out business travel features for quite some time as well.

Lyft is also the cheapest transportation option, according to Certify's latest report. While the average Lyft ride cost $23.53, the average taxi ride cost $39.68, or 55 percent more. The average Uber ride, at $26.41, is also much cheaper than a taxi ride.