Good news! This March, the new 16 plate has arrived, which means now is the perfect time to look for a new car and sweep up one of the top contending number plates. To welcome the new registration to West Way we have created this infographic with some surprising discoveries about registration plates.
Twice a year we get to feast our eyes on new registration plate variations with each change. To stand out from the crowd this year, you can create your own personalised 16 plate. Fancy having your name, something you love or something hilarious to display on your car? Find some inspiration in our infographic!
These three registration plates belong to the rich and famous, but can you match the celebrity to each plate?
· MAGIC
· H4IR DO
· COM IC
Currently the most valuable number plate in the UK is ‘F1’ which is worth £10,000,000 today! While ‘I D’ which has nothing to do with the boy band is worth £350,000, followed by ‘VIP I’ worth £285,000 and ‘CEO I’ worth £154,100. These are just some examples of the most sought-after personalised plates and since the private registration auction service was introduced in 1989, DVLA have raised over £1.8 billion!
Why do we need registration plates?
In the UK, registration plates are used to determine a vehicle’s age and place of origin, and it’s also legal requirement to have the plate displayed while driving on public roads.
You’ll find that there are 3 sections to each registration plate, in order, they consist of the place of origin also known as the ‘local memory tag’ with the ‘age identifier’ followed by a random selection of letters to make the plate unique.
DVLA only have enough numbers for registration plates up until 2051, which is anyone’s guess on what will happen after the numbers run out! Maybe we will see more letters and numbers added to registration plates of the future? Or possibly even special characters added on to them, such as #LE16 EDS?
Banned registration plates
This year has brought a new wave of rude registration plates such as B16 BUT and OR16 ASM, many others are even more inappropriate, which is why we haven’t included them! We live in an age where many people are easily offended and DVLA takes great care in preventing inappropriate and offensive registration plates from being made available to the public.