Iowa license plate: Standard
Issued today Documented since 2026. Standard plates for car, van, truck, and bus, issued by Iowa Department of Transportation, Motor Vehicle Division (plates issued through the county treasurers). One of 6 Iowa license plates.
Format, years and the law
- Format
-
LLL999, for exampleGQM854(L is any letter, 9 any digit)The format above is broad: a registration that fits it has the right shape, which does not show that this series issued it.
- Years issued
- Documented since 2026; the format is likely older than the first year documented. Still issued.
- Vehicle class
- Standard: the default series issued to private road vehicles. Issued for car, van, truck, and bus.
- Size
- 12 × 6 in (305 × 152 mm) · every country's size
Legal basis and sources
- Iowa Code § 321.166(1)(a)-(b): metal, the six-by-twelve CEILING, departmental sizes for small vehicles, the small-trailer regular-plate option; (2) the alphabetical-or-numerical-or-combination grammar, the abbreviable... https://www.legis.iowa.gov/docs/code/321.166.pdf
- Iowa Admin. Code r. 761-401.3(1): the two-character minimum; 401.3(2): the five-character maximum for plates with a processed emblem and for § 321.34(13) plates. [ARC 8937C, IAB 2/19/25, effective 3/26/25] https://www.legis.iowa.gov/docs/iac/chapter/761.401.pdf
This plate in your app
The series id is us-ia-standard. The API returns its format, validation, colours and designs with the rest of Iowa's series:
curl -s https://vehiclesdb.com/api/v1/plates/us-ia \ -H "Authorization: Bearer $VEHICLESDB_API_KEY" \ | jq '.series[] | select(.id == "us-ia-standard")'
- Plate image (SVG, sample serial): https://vehiclesdb.com/plates/us-ia/us-ia-standard.svg
- Blank template, filled on your side: https://vehiclesdb.com/plates/us-ia/us-ia-standard/template.svg
