What font and spacing must a legal number plate use in Northern Ireland?

DfI’s current NI inspection guidance lists the standard measurements for vehicles first registered on or after 1 September 2001: characters are normally 79mm high, 50mm wide except for 1/I, with a 14mm stroke, 11mm character spacing and 33mm between groups.

There are different permitted dimensions for older vehicles, tricycles/quadricycles and certain imports. That is why a plate should be made by a registered supplier using the correct specification for the vehicle rather than copied from an image online.

Rearranging characters to spell a name or closing the legal gap between groups is not permitted.

“Road legal” advertising is not a substitute for the regulations or NI inspection manual. Styling terms such as 3D, 4D, gel, smoked or shortened describe products, not legal exemptions. The decisive questions are whether the plate uses the required material, colours, font, character construction, spacing and margins, and whether the true registration remains immediately legible. When applying the rule, the outcome is that modern NI number plates must use the prescribed registration font and statutory character dimensions and spacing; obvious mis-spacing or non-standard characters can fail the MOT and can attract enforcement. That prevents a rule written for Great Britain or the Republic of Ireland being applied automatically to a Northern Ireland case.