VehiclesDB

Germany license plate: Military bundeswehr

Issued today 1956 to today. Military plates for car, van, truck, bus, motorcycle, and trailer, set by the Fahrzeug-Zulassungsverordnung (FZV). One of 13 Germany license plates.

Germany license plate, Military bundeswehr (1956 to today), sample Y-938403
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Format, years and the law

Format
Y-999999, for example Y-938403 (9 any digit)

Y means the Bundeswehr precisely because it means nothing else: when the army needed a code in the 1950s, X and Y were the letters no German district would ever claim. Y took the troops, X later went to NATO's headquarters, one letter each, no geography at all.

The format above follows the issuing rules: a registration that fits it is one this series could have issued.

Years issued
1956 to today. Still issued.
Vehicle class
Military: armed-forces registration systems. Issued for car, van, truck, bus, motorcycle, and trailer.
Colours
Characters #000000 Background #FFFFFF
Size
520 × 110 mm · every country's size
Typeface
DIN 1451-2:1986-02 (Verkehrsschrift); Anlage 4 Abschnitt 1 Nr. 2.3: Bundeswehr plates and Versicherungskennzeichen use DIN 1451-2, NOT the FE-Schrift; bold Engschrift where the length does not suffice · license plate fonts
About this plate
BUNDESWEHR (Y) AND NATO HEADQUARTERS (X). Y IS 1956-ORIGINAL, Anlage IV A of the 14.3.1956 instrument, verbatim in the source line, together with the military six-digit allowance that today applies to all Anlage 2 vehicles. Y is famously a single letter serving the entire armed forces, which is why it looks like a district code and is not one.

Legal basis and sources

  1. Anlage 2 Nr. 1: 'Y Dienstfahrzeuge der Bundeswehr (Zentrale Militärkraftfahrtstelle, ZMK, Hardter Straße 9, 41179 Mönchengladbach/Rheindahlen)' and 'X Dienstfahrzeuge der auf Grund des Nordatlantikvertrages... https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/fzv_2023/anlage_2.html
  2. Anlage 4 Abschnitt 3: Bundeswehr plate forms (Leichtkrafträder/Kleinkrafträder, other Krafträder, other vehicles single- and two-line) plus RAL 9005/9001, the Bundesfarben, the digit-1 spacing rule and the... https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/fzv_2023/anlage_4.html
  3. § 12 Abs. 2 last sentence: Bundeswehr and NATO-HQ plates are exempt from DIN 74069 and the DIN test mark https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/fzv_2023/__12.html
  4. V. vom 14.3.1956, BGBl. I S. 199, Anlage IV A: 'Y Dienstfahrzeuge der deutschen Streitkräfte (Auskunft: Bundesministerium für Verteidigung)'; § 23 Abs. 2: digits only, 'bei Fahrzeugen der deutschen Streitkräfte sechs'... https://media.offenegesetze.de/bgbl1/1956/bgbl1_1956_15.pdf
  5. FZV vom 25.4.2006, Anlage 3: 'X Dienstfahrzeuge der auf Grund des Nordatlantikvertrages errichteten internationalen militärischen Hauptquartiere, die ihren regelmäßigen Standort im Inland haben', X's earliest secured... https://media.offenegesetze.de/bgbl1/2006/bgbl1_2006_21.pdf

This plate in your app

The series id is de-military-bundeswehr. The API returns its format, validation, colours and designs with the rest of Germany's series:

curl -s https://vehiclesdb.com/api/v1/plates/de \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $VEHICLESDB_API_KEY" \
  | jq '.series[] | select(.id == "de-military-bundeswehr")'
Check plate formats in your app

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