Number Plate Spacing: UK Rules for Private Plates

Short answer: UK number plate spacing is fixed by law. On a standard plate for a car registered from 1 September 2001, there’s 11mm between the characters in each group and 33mm between the two groups. You can’t move the gap, squeeze characters together or use fixing bolts to change how a letter looks, even on a private plate. Get it wrong and you could be fined up to £1,000, your car will fail its MOT, and in some cases the DVLA can take the registration away.

Written by the PlateBoss team, led by owner HD. We’ve been making plates since 2019 and are a DVLA-registered number plate supplier with a workshop in Hounslow, west London. Checked against DVLA leaflet INF104 and GOV.UK guidance, September 2026. How we write our guides.

In this guide

• “Can you just move that gap over a bit?”
• Number plate spacing rules: the exact measurements
• The spacing tricks that make a plate illegal
• Buying a private plate? Check this first
• What happens if your spacing is wrong
• How to check your own plates
• FAQs

“Can you just move that gap over a bit?”

It’s one of the most common things we’re asked at the counter, and it nearly always comes with a private registration. Some version of: “Can you move the gap so it reads like my name?”

Sometimes it’s shifting the 33mm space between the two groups. Sometimes it’s squeezing two characters closer together. And now and then someone has already worked out exactly where they want a black screw cap to go, so a character looks like a different one.

Our answer is always the same. We can only make a road plate with the registration in its correct legal format. Most people are fine once we show them what that will actually look like. A few decide the plate isn’t quite as clever as they thought and leave it.

Number plate spacing rules: the exact measurements

The number plate spacing rules come from the DVLA (leaflet INF104) and apply to every road plate, standard or private, printed or 3D. For vehicles first registered on or after 1 September 2001, these are the measurements every character has to follow:

So on a current-style registration like AB12 CDE, the gap sits between the “12” and the “CDE”, and nowhere else. On older private formats the gap goes where the DVLA’s format puts it, between the letters and numbers, not where it makes a word. Motorbike plates and plates for vehicles registered before September 2001 use different sizes; our motorbike number plate size guide covers those.

The spacing tricks that make a plate illegal

GOV.UK is blunt about it: you can’t rearrange letters or numbers, or alter them so they’re hard to read. The DVLA’s own leaflet goes further and says you can’t rearrange or misrepresent them to form names or words, giving fixing bolts that change a letter or number as an example. These are the tricks we see most:

• Moving the gap. Shifting the 33mm space so the registration splits into a name instead of its proper groups.
• Bunching characters. Closing the 11mm space between two characters so they read as one word, or pushing others apart.
• Strategic screws. Putting a black screw cap in the middle of a character, for example to make a 1 look like an I, or close off a C so it looks like an O.
• Removing the gap altogether. Running every character together so the plate reads as one word.
• Stylised or italic fonts. Any font other than the standard one, which usually comes bundled with bad spacing on novelty sets.

Plates like these usually come from online sellers happy to print whatever you type in. As we explain in our guide to show plates vs road legal plates, “for show use only” in the small print doesn’t protect you once the plate is on a car on the road.

Buying a private plate? Check this first

We see this one regularly. Someone arrives very pleased with a new private registration, holds up a screenshot from the sales advert and says, “It spells my name.”

Then we type the registration into our plate software with the correct spacing.

There’s normally a short silence.

The registration almost spells their name, but only if you move the space, bunch a couple of characters together or put a fixing in just the right place. Sales adverts sometimes show private registrations with creative spacing, which makes them look far better than they will on a legal plate.

So before you spend serious money on a private registration, picture it with the gap in the right place and even spacing. Better still, message us the registration on WhatsApp before you buy and we’ll tell you how it will look on a road-legal plate. The registration itself might be perfectly valid, but you still have to display it in the permitted format.

What happens if your spacing is wrong

• A fine of up to £1,000. Incorrectly displayed number plates are an offence, and the police do stop cars for it.
• An automatic MOT fail. A plate that doesn’t meet the legal requirements is a major defect in the MOT. We covered this in our guide to number plate MOT fails, and badly spaced private plates are an increasing share of the failed MOT customers we see at the workshop.
• Losing the registration. The DVLA says that in some cases a registration number may be permanently withdrawn. For an expensive private plate, that’s the real risk.

The rules could get tougher too. The government consulted earlier this year on bringing in penalty points for illegal and “ghost” number plates. The consultation closed on 11 May 2026 and no decision had been announced when we checked in September 2026.

How to check your own plates in two minutes

1. Count the gaps. There should be exactly one gap between the two groups on a one-line plate, and nothing else.
2. Check where the gap is. On a current-style registration it goes after the two numbers (AB12 CDE). Compare it with the registration printed on your V5C.
3. Look at the spacing between characters. It should look even. If two characters are almost touching, or one sits noticeably further away, something’s wrong.
4. Look at the screws. Fixings should sit in the margins or in the natural spaces, never on a character or where they change its shape.
5. Check the markings. A legal plate made since September 2021 shows the supplier’s name and postcode and the standard number BS AU 145e. No markings usually means no guarantee the spacing is right either.

If any of these fail, the fix is a new pair of plates made to the correct layout. You’ll need your V5C and photo ID, as explained in our guide to the documents needed for number plates.

Plates we make to the correct spacing

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Number plate spacing: FAQs

Sources

• DVLA INF104: Vehicle registration numbers and number plates (April 2022)
• GOV.UK: Displaying number plates
• GOV.UK: Rules for number plates
• GOV.UK: Proposed changes to penalties for motoring offences (consultation)