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Vehicle registration plates of the People's Republic of China

 
Wikipedia: Vehicle registration plates of the People's Republic of China
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Blue PRC licence plates of the 1992 standard (August 2004 image). The last digit has been cropped. This is an example of a vehicle registered to a Chinese citizen or entity.
Black PRC licence plates of the 1992 standard (August 2004 image). The last digit has been cropped. This is an example of a vehicle registered to a foreign person or entity.

The People's Republic of China issues vehicles licence plates at its Vehicle Management Offices, under the administration of the Ministry of Public Security.

Hong Kong and Macau have their own administrations on licence plates. Vehicles from Hong Kong and Macau are required to apply for licence plates, usually from Guangdong province, to travel on roads in Mainland China.

Contents

Types

Common types

The current plates are of the 1992 standard, which consist of the one-character provincial abbreviation, a letter of the alphabet, and five number or letters of the alphabet (Ex. 沪A 12345; 京C A1234; 苏A 1P234; 浙B AB987). Previously, all licence plates had used the five-number designation. As the number of motor vehicles grew, however, the number had to exceed what was the maximum previously allowable -- 90,000 or 100,000 vehicles. Therefore there had become a need to insert Latin letters into the licence plate to increase the number of possible combinations. This was first done in the bigger cities with only one prefix. Nanjing, for example, began the change with only the first number, which increased the number of possible combinations to 340,000 (with the exceptions of O & I, which cannot be printed without confusion with the numbers 0 & 1). Further changes allowed the first two places, or the second place alone on the plate to be letters, allowing 792,000 more combinations mathematically. More recently, cities have taken to having the third letter alone being a Latin letter, the rest numbers. The numbers are produced at random, and are computer-generated at the issuing office. Numbers with a sequence of 6's, 8's, or 9's are usually considered to be lucky, therefore special sequences like "88888" or "86888" can be purchased. (A previous licence plate system, with a green background and the full name of the province in Chinese characters, actually had a sequential numbering order, and the numbering system was eventually beset with corruption.)

Yellow plates are issue for large vehicles of Chinese nationality, such as trucks and buses. These licence plates usually have the Designate Area and Letter on top of the numbers, as opposed to being beside it. (In addition, they may have the licence number sprayed in large letters on the outside of the truck, or in more prominent places.) Blue plates, the most common sort, are issued for vehicles of Chinese nationality which are small or compact in size. Black plates are issued for vehicles belonging to foreigners, and persons from Hong Kong and Macau. (Black licence plates are handed to vehicles of any size, as long as they are of foreign nationality.)

Police Service, Armed Police Force, and Military

Police Service, Armed Police Force, and Military are in a white background, with red and black text.

Police Service plates have a designated format of X·LLNNN·"警" (X being the geographical abbreviation, N being numbers, and L being possible numbers or letters, "警" meaning police and coloured red). These plates are issued to traffic police, some patrol vehicles, court, and procuratorate vehicles.

Chinese People's Armed Police Force ("武警") uses the pinyin abbreviation WJ and use the format WJNN-NNNNN.

The first two small letters behind the WJ are area prefixes:

  • WJ01-NNNNN. = Headquarters
  • WJ31-NNNNN. = Beijing
  • WJ14-NNNNN. = ShanDong
  • WJ21-NNNNN. = Hainan

The Alphabet Numeral behind the area prefix shows the section of the Armed police:

  • WJ01-JNNNN. = Official Guards, Official and Diplomatic Escorts, Riot Police.
  • WJ01-BNNNN. = Border Police
  • WJ01-XNNNN. = Fire Police
  • WJ01-1NNNN. = If there are no Alphabet letters at all it stands for no particular section. Official Use Only.



Military vehicles previously had plates using a code of heavenly stems in red. After reorganization in 2004, military vehicles now use a more organized of prefixes. These license plates use the format XL·NNNNN (X being the prefix, L being a letter).

The People's Liberation Army vehicle prefixes:

  • "军" (Jun; "Military")

Vehicles of the Central Military Commission
Vehicles of the Headquarters of People's Liberation Army
Vehicles of the PLA's units at Army-Grade or above. Deputy-Military-Region-Grade, Military-Region-Grade.

The Ground Force of PLA vehicle of the various military regions have their own prefixes:

The Navy of PLA vehicle prefixes:

  • "海" (Hai)

The Air Force of PLA vehicle prefixes:

  • "空" (Kong)

Motorcycles

Motorcycle licence plates are nearly the same as that for ordinary vehicles, but are less in length and look more like an elongated square than a banner-like rectangle. There are two lines of text (province code and letter on the top, numbers on the bottom).

For qinqi or low-powered motorbikes, yellow licence plates are issued throughout.

Embassy and Consulate

Embassy and consulate vehicles have their own licence plate with a red character and six more white numbers. Embassy plates have a black background (following the foreigner plate standard, previously mentioned). Embassies use 使 (shǐ) (for 使馆) and are used only in Beijing. Consulates use 领 (lǐng) (for 领事馆) and are used for representations outside of Beijing. The character is red instead of white. The six numbers on Embassy plates are formatted such that the first three digits represent what foreign entity/organization the vehicle is registered to (alphabetic order). The last three digits is generally a sequence, where 001 is (generally) the Ambassador's car. Example: 使 224 001 - an American Embassy-registered vehicle, in this case, the Ambassador's limo.

Numbers up to 005 are normally for official use therefore have the comfort of the highest levels of diplomatic immunity. eg: 使 224 005

Embassies and International Organizations at the ambassadorial level Plate Prefixes in Beijing

To protect foreign diplomats the Chinese government does not release information on what embassy each vehicle belongs to. Therefore some information may be wrong.
Here is a subset of the list of embassy prefixes:

Here is a subset of the list of International Organizations at the ambassadorial level prefixes:

Other Types

Vehicles for use in automobile tests, vehicles for use in driving schools (examination and test-driving), and vehicles at airports all have their own separate licence plates.

For automobile tests, licence plates consist of black characters on a yellow background with the suffix shi (short in Chinese for ce shi or test). For driving schools, different plates apply for test-drive vehicles (jiaolian che) and examination vehicles (kaoshi che).

Airports have licence plates with white characters on a green background with the designation min hang (Civilian Air Transportation). This shade of green is slightly lighter than the variant used on normal licence plates prior to 1992.

Cross-border with Hong Kong and Macau

Guangdong border crossing plate displayed on a vehicle below a standard Hong Kong plate.

Licence plates with a black background and the character 港 or 澳 in place of the last number are used for Hong Kong and Macau vehicles, respectively, when they engage in cross-border traffic to and from Mainland China. These plates often exist side by side with a local HK or Macau licence plate on the same car. See the section on Guangdong license plates.

Interim licence plates

Interim licence plates are a piece of paper to be affixed to the front of the vehicle's window. They appear to have been withdrawn as of recently.

The Short-Lived 2002 Licence Plate Standard

For a short while in the summer of 2002, a new 2002 Licence Plate Standard was instituted in several cities, including Beijing. They enabled number/alphabetical customisation. (The possible combinations were NNN-NNN, NNN-LLL and LLL-NNN, where N would be a number and L a letter. However, although the usage of "CHN", to designate China, was not permitted in the licence plates, that restriction, oddly enough, did not apply to the letters "PRC".) The VIN was also added to the new licence plates, and the plates were white, with a gradual blue tint at the bottom end of the plates. Black letters were used on the plate.

In late August 2002 new 2002 standard plates had their issuance temporarily interrupted, officially for technical reasons, but actually because some lewd, provocative and controversial number/alphabetical combinations were used. One of the biggest controversies was when a vehicle with licence plate number USA-911 was spotted in Beijing, causing an uproar. Equal uproars were created with such plates as PRC-001, and trademark violations were rife; the plate number IBM-001 was seen. The WTO acronym was also spotted in the licence plates. In a society that is still rather conservative in this topic, the licence plate SEX-001 was the source of yet another controversy. The number 250, an insult in spoken Chinese, was also spotted in some plates.

Possibly due to the controversies as described above, as of summer 2003, the new plates are no longer being issued. Old licence plates of the 2002 standard are not being recalled.

New 2007 Standard (GA36－2007)

The Ministry of Public Security has announced on October 30, 2007, that the 1992 vehicle license plate system will be overhauled on November 1, 2007.

Major Points of interest:

  • The current black license plates assigned to foreign-owned vehicles will be phased out. New vehicles will be issued "normal" blue license plates.
  • Two roman letters (not including O, or I, which could be confused with numerals) may be included among the last five places of the plate number.

Number plates issued in the 1992 standard will not be recalled but black plates will no longer be issued. Neither will plates issued to embassies be affected.

It is believed this is a China-wide standard.

Official Beijing Traffic Bureau announcement (Chinese)

List of prefixes

The following lists all licence plate prefixes in use in the People's Republic of China, divided into four sections: municipalities, provinces, autonomous regions and others.

This list might not be up to date, complete or accurate. Please amend as you see fit.

Municipalities

Beijing

Initial character of licence plates used in Beijing is: 京 (Pinyin: Jīng)

  • 京A - Urban area
  • 京A·8 - Government Offices Administration of the State Council
  • 京C, 京E, 京F, 京H, 京J, 京K, 京L, 京M, - Urban area
  • 京B - Taxis
  • 京G - Suburbs
  • 京N, 京P, 京Y - Suburbs and urban area

The difference between the urban area and suburbs was revoked by competent authority since April 25 of 2009.

  • 京O·A - Ministry of Public Security
  • 京O·B - Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau
  • 京V - Central Guard Bureau of Beijing Garrison Military License

This license plate is different from the other civilian license with blue background. It's word and figures on white background. As a matter of fact, it is military license at all, and has an unique characteristic.
There is only one garrison in Mainland China - Beijing Garrison (Beijing WeiShuQu; "北京卫戍区"), other guarding area called "XX Guarding Area" (XX JingBeiQu; "XX警备区"). Chinese simplified character "卫" (one of "北京卫戍区"/Beijing Garrison) has the same pronunciation with the "V". So, the "京" (Jing) and the "V", their pronunciation is Jing Wei, Chinese is "京卫", it is a Chinese abbreviation of "北京卫戍区" (Beijing Garrison).
1) General license for the red word "京" and black 'V' along with figures.
2) Crucial vehicle for the red word "京" and 'V' with black figures.
Misunderstanding
Some people think that "京V" does not belong to one unit, it belongs to various machinery. In fact, Beijing Garrison takes charge in safekeeping services and aims at important leadership in various machinery of states, including military, party, and government. Traffic safety is part of security. So the vehicle of leadership belonging to garrison systems.

Chongqing

Initial character of licence plates used in Chongqing is: 渝 (Yú)

Shanghai

Initial character of licence plates used in Shanghai is: 沪 (Hù)

  • 沪A, 沪B, 沪D, 沪E, 沪F — Urban area
  • 沪C — Suburbs
  • 沪O — Police vehicles

Tianjin

Initial character of licence plates used in Tianjin is: 津 (Jīn)

  • 津A, 津B, 津C, 津F — Urban area
  • 津E — Taxis

Provinces

Anhui

Initial character of licence plates used in Anhui is: 皖 (Wǎn)

Fujian

Initial character of licence plates used in Fujian is: 闽 (Mǐn)

Gansu

Initial character of licence plates used in Gansu is: 甘 (Gān)

Guangdong

Black PRC licence plates of the 1992 standard for vehicles from Hong Kong that are authorized to cross into Mainland China.

Initial character of licence plates used in Guangdong is: 粤 (Yuè)

Guizhou

Initial character of licence plates used in Guizhou is: 贵 (Guì)

Hainan

Initial character of licence plates used in Hainan is: 琼 (Qióng)

Hebei

Initial character of licence plates used in Hebei is: 冀 (Jì)

Heilongjiang

Initial character of licence plates used in Heilongjiang is: 黑 (Hēi)

Henan

Initial character of licence plates used in Henan is: 豫 (Yù)

Hubei

Initial character of licence plates used in Hubei is: 鄂 (È)

Hunan

Initial character of licence plates used in Hunan is: 湘 (Xiāng)

Jiangsu

Initial character of licence plates used in Jiangsu is: 苏 (Sū)

Jiangxi

Initial character of licence plates used in Jiangxi is: 赣 (Gàn)

Jilin

Initial character of licence plates used in Jilin is: 吉 (Jí)

Liaoning

Initial character of licence plates used in Liaoning is: 辽 (Liáo)

Qinghai

Initial character of licence plates used in Qinghai is: 青 (Qīng)

Shaanxi

Initial character of licence plates used in Shaanxi is: 陕 (Shǎn)

Shandong

Initial character of licence plates used in Shandong is: 鲁 (Lǔ)

Shanxi

Initial character of licence plates used in Shanxi is: 晋 (Jìn)

Sichuan

Initial character of licence plates used in Sichuan is: 川 (Chuān)

Yunnan

Initial character of licence plates used in Yunnan is: 云 (Yún)

Zhejiang

Initial character of licence plates used in Zhejiang is: 浙 (Zhè)

Autonomous regions

Guangxi

Initial character of licence plates used in Guangxi is: 桂 (Guì)

Inner Mongolia

Initial character of licence plates used in Inner Mongolia is: 蒙 (Měng)

Ningxia

Initial character of licence plates used in Ningxia is: 宁 (Níng)

Tibet

Initial character of licence plates used in Tibet is: 藏 (Zàng)

Xinjiang

Initial character of licence plates used in Xinjiang is: 新 (Xīn)

See also

External links

  • Scanned images of GA36-2007 (License plate of motor vehicle of the People’s Republic of China)
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Italics indicates an unrecognised or partially recognised country.  1 Sometimes included in Europe, depending on the border definitions.  2 Officially known as Myanmar.  3 Sometimes included in Oceania, and also known as Timor-Leste.  4 Transcontinental country.  5 Commonly known as Taiwan. 
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