Registration Plates 1963 - 1983 The last letter of the registration told us the year of regisration. 1984 - 2001 The first letter of the registration told us the year of regisration. 2001- 2049 The first two letters of the number plate will show where the car was first registered. The second letter is the local identifier and indicates which office it was registered through. The new registration is designed to last until 2050, with changes every March and September. The second two characters are numbers that indicate the age of the car.

From 1 September 2001 all new number plates must display the new mandatory font.
Combined with the new format registration mark, number plates will become clearer and easier to remember.

Number plates fitted before 1 September 2001 need not be changed provided the character font used is substantially the same as the one shown above.

Number plates must be replaced if they have been customised with:

Stylised letters and/or figures such as italics Number plate fixing bolts that alter the appearance of the letters and/or numbers

Click here for official registration plate sizes

2001-2049	The local memory tag (MA) for this registration is for Manchester (M followed by the local office identifier letter from A to Y). (See Table 4) The registration tag (02) tells us that the car was registered in March 2002. (See Table 3) (52 would have been Sept 2002)
1984-2001	The registration tag tell us that this car was registered between August 1988 and July 1989 (see Table 2)
1963 -1983	The registration tag tell us that this car was registered between August 1982 and July 1983. (See Table 1)