# New Zealand number plate: Personalised

> The New Zealand personalised number plate: format LLLLLL, for example LEXYXO, 1988 to today. What each character means, its sizes and sources.

Page: https://vehiclesdb.com/license-plates/new-zealand/personalised-1988 · Markdown version of the HTML page, which is canonical. Site map: https://vehiclesdb.com/llms.txt · Terms of use: https://vehiclesdb.com/legal/terms

Part of [New Zealand license plates](https://vehiclesdb.com/license-plates/new-zealand) (18 registration series).

![New Zealand license plate, Personalised (1988 to today)](https://vehiclesdb.com/plates/nz/nz-personalised-1988/new-zealand-license-plate-personalised.svg)

| Fact | Value |
|---|---|
| Format | `LLLLLL` (L is any letter) |
| Years | 1988 → today |
| Class | personalized |
| Issued for | car, van, truck, bus, motorcycle, moped, trailer, caravan, tractor |
| Colours | background #FFFFFF; characters #000000 |
| Rear plate differs from the front | no |
| Checking a registration | The format above is broad: a registration that fits it has the right shape, which does not show that this series issued it. |
| Series id | `nz-personalised-1988` (https://vehiclesdb.com/license-plates/new-zealand/personalised-1988) |

Sources:

- [reg 34 in full (identifier, caps, refusal grounds, colours, material); reg 40 display; reg 43 transfer; reg 3 'exclusive right to personalised plates'](https://www.legislation.govt.nz/regulation/public/2011/0079/latest/whole.html)
- [milestone 1988, verbatim: 'Personalised plates are introduced, providing a source of income for road safety research and projects.'; 'introduced in 1988, these plates can have up to six numbers or letters'](https://www.nzta.govt.nz/roads-and-rail/research-and-data/fascinating-facts/number-plates)
- ['Personalised plates can have up to 6 characters ... include captions, messages or slogans'; the white-or-silver-on-black and black-red-or-blue-on-white palettes; 'When you buy a personalised plate, you're buying the exclusive right to that set of characters.'](https://www.nzta.govt.nz/vehicles/licensing-rego/number-plates)

## What each position encodes

- 1 to 6 characters, letters or numerals or both, chosen by the purchaser and approved by the Registrar

## About this plate

There is no grammar to be strict about: the law caps the length and forbids offence, and everything else is the purchaser's choice. The 1964-era ZZ9990-ZZ9999 block was likewise sold ahead of the scheme, which is why the two-letter series is recorded as ending at ZZ9989.

## Who the plate belongs to

the exclusive right is allocated to a PERSON under s 259 of the Act and transfers between vehicles and between people (reg 43), the one New Zealand series that does not bind to a vehicle

## Use it

- Plate image (SVG): https://vehiclesdb.com/plates/nz/nz-personalised-1988.svg
- Make it with your own text: https://vehiclesdb.com/license-plate-generator/new-zealand?series=nz-personalised-1988
- API: `GET https://vehiclesdb.com/api/v1/plates/nz` returns this series as the entry with `"id": "nz-personalised-1988"` (https://vehiclesdb.com/api)

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Open data, CC BY 4.0: reuse it with a visible credit to VehiclesDB and a link (https://vehiclesdb.com/legal/attribution). Plate images show sample serials and are not open data (https://vehiclesdb.com/legal/image-license). Dataset commit db0ec0a: https://github.com/vehiclesdb/vehiclesdb