£518 million. 1,246,290 private plates. One dataset.
We track every private registration DVLA sells, from its fixed-price list and its timed online auctions, and match each one to DVLA vehicle records. It is the fullest public picture of the UK private plate market, and it is on this page.
Updated 27 July 2026, nightly and after each auction31.2% of the 1,246,290 plates we track have no vehicle recorded against them. Some buyers hold a plate deliberately, on a retention certificate, as an asset they never assign. That is a real and sizeable part of the market, and it is one of the more interesting things this data shows.
The honest limit: that 31.2% combines plates held deliberately with plates we simply could not match. Our identification runs at about 73% on cars that should be identifiable, so some of this figure is match failure, not a decision never to fit the plate. The true share held purely as assets is therefore somewhat below a third, which is why we say "up to". We show exactly how this is worked out in our methodology.
It is a pattern that runs right through the market, from the everyday fixed-price plates most people buy to the five-figure auction lots bought as investments.
What the data shows
Six findings from the dataset, each drawn from the page that proves it.
The four pages
Each one takes a single question and answers it from the data.
Private plate prices
What plates really cost, from the everyday fixed-price list to five-figure auction lots, and what drives the difference.
See the prices →Most expensive number plates
Every DVLA auction result ranked by price, the top 100 plates, and which cars they ended up on.
See the ranking →Which drivers buy private plates
Which makes and models are most likely to wear a private plate, ranked by how far they beat the national rate.
See who buys →DVLA auction results
Results from every DVLA auction we track, latest first, with the full archive and the top lots of each sale.
See the results →For journalists and researchers
The data on these pages is free to use. If you need something we have not published, ask, and we will usually be able to help.
Free to cite
Every figure here is free to quote in your reporting or research, with a link back to the page you took it from.
Custom data cuts
Need a breakdown we have not published, a longer time series or higher-resolution figures? Get in touch or email [email protected].
How the data is built
The full method, sources and limits are set out on our methodology page.
How current it is
Last updated 27 July 2026. The dataset is rebuilt nightly, and again after each DVLA auction closes.
"Yellowhite tracks every private registration DVLA sells, matched to DVLA vehicle records, and updates the data nightly." Source: Yellowhite, yellowhite.co.uk.
How we compile the data
Two sources sit behind every figure: DVLA's fixed-price stock, monitored from its published listings since January 2024, and DVLA's timed online auction results, loaded after each auction since January 2025. We never blend the two into one average, because a fixed price is what DVLA charges and an auction price is what a plate is worth.
Every plate is matched against official vehicle enquiry and MOT records to work out which car, if any, it ended up on. Likelihood figures divide a make or model's share of plate purchases by its share of vehicles on the road, using raw vehicle counts rather than rounded percentages, with makes and models below 50 plates or 5,000 licensed vehicles excluded as too small to measure.
The full working, including the honest limit on the never-assigned figure, is on the methodology page.