Size

Number plates can come in various sizes and shapes. Some cars have specifically shaped plates that are more suited to that vehicle. With regards to size and shape you are not limited in what you can have providing you meet certain criteria.

As long as the characters have an 11mm margin all around the plate you are within the regulations. So there needs to be 11mm space from the top of the character to the top edge of the number plate, 11mm space from the bottom of the character to the bottom edge of the plate, 11mm space from the left edge of the plate to the edge of the first character and an 11mm gap from the last character to the right edge of the plate.

What sizes do we do?

We do various short plates and shaped plates to suit your needs. The short plates we stock are 18 inch all the way to 13 inch. We also stock several of the most common shaped plates. If there is a particular plate you need and you cannot find it on our site but can see it below then get in contact with us as we may be able to source this for you.

Short Plates

What are they?

Short plates are basically plates that are shorter than your typical standard number plate which is 20.5 inches in length (520MM).

Are they legal?

Short plates are fully legal providing the space from the beginning of the plate to the first character and the space from the last character to the end of the plate are at least 11MM each.

Please see below for a general guide of the smallest size allowed for the number of characters on a plate.

Number of characters	Smallest size we have available that would be legal
2 characters	13 inch
3 characters	13 inch
4 characters	13 inch
5 characters	14 inch
6 characters	16 inch
7 characters	Standard 20.5 inch

Please note these are based on registrations that do not have the number 1 or letter I in them. Registrations with 1 or I can go on shorter plates, please see example below for better understanding.

Example

AB62 CDE is a 7 character registration an would not be able to go on any of our short plates.

AB61 CDE is also a 7 character registration but has the number 1. This will be able to go on our short plates (shortest being 17 inch) as the number 1 (or letter I) takes less space than any other character.

How to calculate how short you can have your registration:

Step 1:

Multiply the number of characters you have in your registration by 50 (excluding the number 1 or letter i)

Step 2:

For every number 1 or letter i you have in your registration add 14

Step 3:

If you have a:

2 character registration add 55

3 character registration add 66

4 character registration add 77

5 character registration add 88

6 character registration add 99

7 character registration add 110

(Please include the number 1 or letter i as a character)

Once you have your total this is the number in millimeters of the minimum size your plate must be in length.

Example:

Registration: AB61 CDE

Step 1:

6 characters (excluding the number 1) multiplied by 50 gives 300.

Step 2:

Add 14 as there is a character 1

Step 3:

It is a 7 character registration so we need to add 110

The total gives us 424 millimeters and therefore the smallest size this plate can legally go on.

Inches	Millimeters
13	330
14	355
15	381
16	406
17	431
18	457
Standard 20.5	520

424mm is less than 431mm and therefore the smallest size this registration can go on is 17 inch and above.