Taxi Cab Service in NYC

Most trips in New York start the same way: you need a taxi, and you need to know it will turn up. In Midtown a yellow cab is easy. Two blocks into Sunset Park at 11pm it is not, and the gap between those two experiences is what this page is about.

TaxiService.nyc is a prearranged taxi and car service. You tell us the pickup, destination and time; we confirm the vehicle and the full price; the car is assigned to your booking. We do not dispatch metered yellow cabs or take street hails — so here is an honest answer to "should I just take a cab?", and how to book one of ours when the answer is no.

Book a taxi cab in NYC in three steps

1. Send the trip. Use the form on this page or call (888) 201-0419 — pickup address, destination, date, time, passengers and bags.
2. Get the price. Reservations confirm the vehicle class and a total that shows tolls, airport fees and gratuity, so there is no meter running in traffic.
3. Ride. Your driver meets you at the address. First ride with us? Ask for 10% off the base fare.

Choose an Economy Sedan for an everyday taxi-style ride, an executive black car for business, a Luxury SUV for up to six, or a taxi van for groups of up to 14.

Yellow, green, and prearranged

Three things get called "a cab" in New York and they are not interchangeable.

Yellow medallion taxis can pick up a street hail anywhere in the five boroughs. There are roughly 13,500 of them and they concentrate heavily below 96th Street in Manhattan and around the airports and major transport hubs.

Green boro taxis run the same TLC meter but are restricted on pickup: northern Manhattan above West 110th and East 96th Street, plus the Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens (outside the airport terminals) and Staten Island. They exist precisely because yellow cabs never served those areas well. There are fewer of them and they get sparse at night.

Prearranged for-hire vehicles — what we dispatch — cannot legally accept a street hail. They have to be arranged in advance. That constraint is also the feature: the car is assigned to your reservation, so it arrives where and when you said, in the class you asked for.

How the meter works, and where it costs you

Metered rates are set by the NYC Taxi & Limousine Commission and are identical in every yellow and green cab. Rather than repeat the figures here and let them drift, they live in one place on this site: the fare comparison worksheet, which was checked against TLC guidance and shows how a fare builds up.

The structural point is worth understanding whatever the numbers are. The meter charges its unit per fifth of a mile or per minute stationary, whichever is happening. Above roughly 12 mph you are paying for distance; below it you are paying for time. In stop-start traffic you are mostly paying for time.

That is why the same physical journey can vary substantially depending on when you make it. A Midtown-to-Downtown run at 2pm and the same run at 5:45pm are different prices, and the second one also carries the weekday afternoon peak surcharge.

If the trip is long, or at peak, or crosses a river, get a quote and compare. Taxi versus private car service works through the comparison in detail.

Luggage, groups and things a hail cannot solve

There is no luggage charge in a New York taxi — bags travel free, including in the boot. What there is instead is a capacity limit. A standard sedan seats four and takes about two large cases. Five people, or four people with four cases, needs a larger vehicle, and no amount of waving gets one to stop.

Request child seats in advance and confirm availability and suitability with reservations before travel. A yellow cab won't carry one, so see car service with car seats if you are travelling with small children.

Our own classes run from an economy or executive sedan for up to three, through luxury SUVs for up to six, to an executive Sprinter for up to 14 — see the fleet page for capacities, and group transportation for parties over six.

Accessibility

A portion of the yellow fleet is wheelchair accessible, but you cannot tell which portion is passing you. If you need a ramp-equipped vehicle, it has to be arranged — read accessible travel requests for what we can and cannot provide, because that page is deliberately honest about it rather than implying we operate a ramp-equipped fleet.

Outer-borough reality

This is the honest part. Yellow cab supply follows demand, and demand is densest in Manhattan below 96th Street. Everywhere else, availability drops — sharply after 10pm, and sharply again in bad weather, which is exactly when you want one most.

Green boro taxis fill some of that gap during the day. At 4am in Tottenville or Throgs Neck they do not. That is the entire reason our outer-borough work exists, and it is why the borough pages go into real local detail rather than repeating the same paragraph five times.

Booking a prearranged car

Call (888) 201-0419 any hour of any day, or use the form on this page — it opens WhatsApp with your trip details filled in, ready for you to send.

Give us the pickup address, where you are going, the time, how many passengers and how many bags. If it is an airport trip, add the flight number.

Choosing a vehicle for this trip

Start with Economy Sedan if value is your priority and a sedan fits your passengers and bags. Choose an executive sedan for a black car arrival, a luxury SUV for more space, or a Sprinter for a group. Confirm the assigned model and luggage capacity before reserving. First-time customers can request 10% off their first ride; the discount and separately charged items are shown in the quote.

Your questions, answered