page_title: Vehicle registration plate
section_title: Australia
hierarchical_section_title: Vehicle registration plate / Oceania / Australia
caption_attribution_description: English: General issue vehicle registration plate of Western Australia, standard size, 1EYB-674.
context_page_description: A vehicle registration plate, also known as a number plate or license plate, is a metal or plastic plate attached to a motor vehicle or trailer for official identification purposes. All countries require registration plates for road vehicles such as cars, trucks, and motorcycles. Whether they are required for other vehicles, such as bicycles, boats, or tractors, may vary by jurisdiction. The registration identifier is a numeric or alphanumeric ID that uniquely identifies the vehicle or vehicle owner within the issuing region's vehicle register. In some countries, the identifier is unique within the entire country, while in others it is unique within a state or province. Whether the identifier is associated with a vehicle or a person also varies by issuing agency. There are also electronic license plates.
context_section_description: In Australia, vehicle registration plates, usually known as number plates or 'rego plates', are normally issued by the State or Territory government; until 2000 some were issued by the Commonwealth government. Plates are associated with a vehicle and generally last for its life, though as they become unreadable (or for other reasons) they may be recalled or replaced with newer ones. New plates are issued when the vehicle is registered in another state, or if the owner requests them (though this depends on state laws).
  Australian number plates were originally issued with white characters on black plates, black on white, black on yellow and blue on white, with each state and territory being allocated a range of plates inside the larger range AAA000 to ZZZ999. New South Wales, for example, was allocated AAA000 to FZZ999, Victoria was allocated from GAA000 to MZZ999, Queensland was allocated NAA000 to QZZ999 and South Australia was allocated from RAA000 to TZZ999. Western Australia was allocated UAA000 and XAA000, Tasmania and the Australia Capital Territory were allocated the series beginning with W and Y respectively. This system worked for a few decades but had been almost completely abandoned by 1980, particularly because some states had exhausted their allocated range of combinations. The Northern Territory never adopted the system.
  The states then chose their own systems. New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia all retained xxx-nnn, but each started again from AAA-000. Queensland reversed the arrangement to nnn-xxx. Western Australia took nxx-nnn, and the ACT kept the Y plate range but substituted the last digit for a letter, giving Yxx-nnx. In 2013, Victoria became the last state to abandon the xxx-nnn format.
  Current arrangements are listed below.
  All current plates are manufactured to uniform dimensions and are made of pressed aluminium, except for certain special series plates; the form of which differs by state and design.
  In 1942, the government released a new special series only alphabet (XB-AA OPS).
caption: Western Australia number plate
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