Argentine license plates (in Spanish, chapas patentes or simply patentes) are used to uniquely identify motor vehicles on the roads of Argentina. The current system employs three letters followed by three digits, issued consecutively, but the license plate system underwent significant changes before the use of this format.
The history of license plates in Argentina can be broken down in two major phases, the decentralized phase (until 1972) and the centralized one (since 1972). During the decentralized phase, license plates were assigned by each municipality or by the provinces, while during the second phase, the national state took charge of standardizing and centralizing the design and style.
The first formal patents were issued in the early 1900s, although few records of them exist. The period between 1916 and 1969 was the most prolific in designs. Each district was allowed to issue its own license plates.
1964-1994: Identifying the provinces
In 1958, under Decree Law 6582, the National Registry of Automotive Property (RNPA) was created. It is a body dependent on the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights, whose mission is to regulate everything related to the registration of ownership of motor vehicles, subsequent procedures and pledge credits. Its first objective was to unify, regulate and standardize the different identifications or automotive patents, a task carried out until then by each municipality in the country autonomously.
The format of the first license plates created by the RNPA, issued from June 1, 1964, consisted of a letter and six numerical digits printed in white in relief on a black background, and all its content was framed by a thin white painted box also in relief. The letter identified the province or district where the automobile was located, while the numbers were generated consecutively, although zoned according to the corresponding registry. These first patents used a somewhat small typeface that made it difficult to read them at a certain distance, especially when faced with police requirements. Due to this inconvenience, in the mid-1970s a new format of larger patent plate began to be issued, where the characters were larger and in which the white box was also eliminated, as can be seen in the photograph on the right. Although this considerably changed and improved the appearance of the patent plates themselves, it did not modify the patent system at all and kept the same numerical sequence. This change was observed more quickly in the Federal Capital and some districts of Greater Buenos Aires, although the vast majority of sectional registries began to issue the new plates between the end of 1970 and the beginning of 1971.
However, between 1972 and 1973 many vehicles with the old format were also patented and re-patented, but they were issued by those sections with little registration activity that took much longer to exhaust the number series (from 200 to 500 numbers) assigned to them by the RNPA during 1970. The vast majority were small towns in the interior of the provinces or far from the big cities; this was gradually regularized when each registry mentioned began to issue a new assigned number series, already with the patent plates in the definitive format.
Patenting
Once the RNPA was created, the main objective of the new state body was to integrate the entire country under the same vehicle patenting system, but this task would require a large logistics organization, unprecedented until then, which had to be carefully planned to be carried out in different stages, which were the following:
On Monday, June 1, 1964, the Federal Capital was the first district in the country designated to begin with the new patenting, being the only one to do so throughout the rest of that year, as the first step for the gradual and programmed insertion of the new automotive patenting system.
The second step of the plan began in 1965 in the province of Buenos Aires, but for organizational reasons it was decided that the new patenting would be carried out initially in 17 districts of the Buenos Aires suburbs at that time (General Sarmiento was not included). nor Esteban Echeverría).
Two years later, in July 1967, Mendoza, Neuquén and Salta were the next provinces that began to patent the new system.
Between September and December 1969, the starting point for the new patenting was designated in the rest of the municipalities of the province of Buenos Aires, that is, those districts that made up the interior of the province. General Sarmiento and Esteban Echeverría also joined, since they were not included in Greater Buenos Aires in 1965.
Finally, between 1968 and 1969 the rest of the provinces were incorporated.
This patenting scheme was valid until December 31, 1994, except for the province of Mendoza, which began with the current system of alphanumeric patents on December 1, 1994.
Repatents
However, the arduous task of repatenting the entire vehicle fleet that had not yet been incorporated, that is, those vehicles that did not manage to register from zero kilometers to the new system, still remained to be carried out. Mendoza, Neuquén and Salta were the first districts to start with mandatory repatenting as of January 2, 1968. Little more than two years later, in February 1970, when the rest of the provinces whose registries were already prepared and organized for issue the new patent plates, the mandatory re-registration of the rest of the vehicle fleet began. The repatents were programmed to reregister the entire remaining vehicle fleet from the newest to the oldest units, in that order. Each repatented year was set at a maximum period of 3 months, with the year 1973 as the limit to complete the entire process. However, a good number of vehicles received their new patent in later years, leaving very few cases of those that never did and the vast majority were abandoned units or that ended their existence as scrap.
The following list details chronologically how this stage was executed:
Since 01/02/1968: registration of patented units prior to 1967 in the provinces of Mendoza, Neuquén and Salta.
From 01/02/1970: re-registration of patented units prior to June 1, 1964 in the Federal Capital.
Since 01/02/1970: re-registration of patented units prior to 1965 in Greater Buenos Aires (17 parties).
Since 01/02/1970: re-registration of patented units prior to 1969 or 1970 (depending on the district) in the rest of the province of Buenos Aires (104 districts).
From 01/02/1970: re-registration of patented units prior to 1968 or 1969 (depending on the province) in the rest of the country.
There were no special numbers or series to identify the repatented units, contrary to what happens today, since they were shared at the same time with the new units. This explained the non-relationship of the model of a much older automobile with respect to the year of issuance of its new patent. To cite just one example: in 1972 it was very common to find the license plate number of a zero kilometer Ford Falcon that was close to, followed by or before the license plate number of a 1947 Chevrolet, among thousands and thousands of other cases.
1972-1994: Identifying the provinces
Typical Argentine registration plate, 1972-1994 format
In 1972 the national government standardized the plates, the format being one letter and six digits, with embossed characters painted white against a black background. The letter identified the issuing province (or city, in the case of Buenos Aires), with the numbers issued consecutively in each jurisdiction. The letter usually was the first letter of the province's name, but for multiple provinces beginning with the same letters, some provinces were issued other letters (such as X for Córdoba, P for Formosa, A for Salta, Q for Neuquen and N for Misiones); this standard is still used in the ISO 3166-2:ARgeocode.
The only two districts to exceed one million license plates issued were the province of Buenos Aires (in 1973 it exceeded one million and in 1984 two million) and the Federal Capital (in 1980 it reached one million). As the original format contemplated only six digits, a conflict was unexpectedly generated by incorporating another new digit using the same plate format and its typography, but the issue was quickly resolved by moving the province identification letter a little upwards and adding a number extra below it representing just the unit of a million.
1995-2016: A national standard
Typical Argentine registration plate, 1995-2016 format
In 1994 the government decreed that all vehicles sold on or after January 1, 1995 were to have a new license plate design, used vehicles would get new plates upon re-sale after that date, and all other vehicles would be issued with new plates in stages.
The new design consists of three letters followed by three digits, and removes any clues identifying the vehicle's province of origin. This was advertised as a federalist move from the government.
In a move to simplify the transition, all plates issued to vehicles sold prior to the cut-off date started with the letter R (and successively S, T, U, V, W, and part of the X series), while vehicles being registered for the first time received plates in a series starting alphabetically with AAA 000. The lettering is impressed in white on a black background. The plates also have a white frame with the word Argentina at the top, screened in light blue. All materials are reflective, to improve visibility on the road. Some plates feature a small "D" or "T" between the letters and the numbers, denoting that this plate is a duplicate or triplicate when the previous plate or plates had been damaged, lost or stolen.
In some provinces, unofficial stickers, with the province name printed in the same type and size of the word "Argentina", were issued and sold to be added to the bottom edge of the plate, as a way to identify the province (as in the old plate pattern). This system, however, did not become popular and was rarely used.
Limits of the system
The 3-letter-plus-3-digit code allows for 263 × 103 = 17,576,000 license plates. RAA-000 to ZZZ-999 were reserved for older vehicles. Since 1995, new licenses have been issued starting from AAA-000. In July 2005, new cars have licenses starting with F, while about the same month in 2004, license plates started with E. An efficient solution would be to add a fourth letter, which will increase the system's capacity by a factor of 26, to 456,976,000 vehicles (a fourth number would only increase it tenfold to 175,760,000 licenses). In August 2008, new cars had plates starting with HK. As of 2009[update], the series has reached the mid I series. In January 2015 the series had reached already the O series.
Evolution of lettering (starts January 1, 1995)
Jan 1st, 1995 - AA-
Jan 1st, 1996 - AP-
Jan 1st, 1997 - BD-
Jan 1st, 1998 - BV-
Jan 1st, 1999 - CO-
Jan 1st, 2000 - DC-
Jan 1st, 2001 - DQ-
Jan 1st, 2002 - DX-
Jan 1st, 2003 - EC-
Jan 1st, 2004 - EH-
Jan 1st, 2005 - ET-
Jan 1st, 2006 - FI-
Jan 1st, 2007 - GA-
Jan 1st, 2008 - GV-
Jan 1st, 2009 - HU-
Jan 1st, 2010 - IN-
Jan 1st, 2011 - JN-
Jan 1st, 2012 - KU-
Jan 1st, 2013 - LZ-
Jan 1st, 2014 - NM-
Jan 1st, 2015 - ON-
Jan 1st, 2016 - PM-
According to first letter start:
A - JAN 1995
B - OCT 1996
C - MAR 1998
D - NOV 1999
E - MAY 2002
F - JUN 2005
G - DEC 2006
H - FEB 2008
I - APR 2009
J - JUL 2010
K - MAY 2011
L - FEB 2012
M - JAN 2013
N - AUG 2013
O - JUL 2014
P - JUL 2015
From 2016: Mercosur standard
This section needs to be updated. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information.(March 2018)
In October 2014 the design of the new license plate to be used by all Mercosur countries was officially presented. It consists of a plate of 400mm ×130mm (15.75in ×5.12in), with a white background, the characters and frame in black and a blue band at the top that shows the name of the country, its flag and the Mercosur logo. The typeface used is FE-Schrift. In Argentina, the serial format is AA 000 AA, allowing a total of 450 million combinations. The system started with AA 000 AA, AA 000 AB ... AA 000 AZ, AA 000 BA... AA 000 ZZ, AA 001 AA... By January 2017, there were plates with license numbers as high as AA 950 AA. It is expected the AB series to start in February 2017. Series AC started in December 2017, while AD started in November 2018. As of April 2019, the highest number is AD530.
101 ABC 123; alpha-numeric sequence matches that of primary mover
same design as standard plate but with narrower serial characters
Transporte Nacional de Cargas
ABC 123
teal on yellow; more square plate
Approximate evolution of current patenting year by year
Note: relative data, since the combinations may vary according to the sectional registry that issued them and therefore the third letter of each combination is not included, since they do not all coincide on the same dates.
Date
Combination
January
AAA
January
AN_
January
BD_
January
BU_
January
CN_
January
DC_
January
DP_
January
DX_
January
ED_
January
EJ_
January
EU_
January
FI_
January
GB_
January
GV_
January
HU_
January
IM_
January
JN_
January
KV_
January
MC_
January
NM_
January
ON_
January
PM_
April
AA000AA
January
AA900AA
February
AB000AA
October
AC000AA
January
AC050AA
July
AD000AA
January
AD250AA
October
AE000AA
January
AE050AA
January
AE650AA
August
AF000AA
January
AF100AA
Approximate start dates of each main letter
Note: relative data, given that the combinations may vary according to the sectional registry that issued them and therefore they do not all coincide on the same dates.
Letter
Date / Usage
A
January
B
September
C
February
D
October
E
April
F
June
G
December
H
February
I
April
J
July
K
May
L
February
M
December
N
August
O
July
P
July
Q
The eventual use is reserved
R
For vehicles prior to the implementation of the system
S
For vehicles prior to the implementation of the system
T
For vehicles prior to the implementation of the system
U
For vehicles prior to the implementation of the system
V
For vehicles prior to the implementation of the system
W
For vehicles prior to the implementation of the system
X
For vehicles prior to the implementation of the system
A vehicle registration plate, also known as a number plate, license plate or licence 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.
The most common format for vehicle registration plates in Romania consists of black letters on white background in the format CC 12 ABC, where CC is a two letter county code, 12 is a two digit group, and ABC is a three letter group. For Bucharest, the format is B 12 ABC or B 123 ABC, where B is code for Bucharest city, 12 and 123 is a two or three digit group, and ABC is a three letter group. The left side of the plate bears a blue vertical strip displaying the 12 stars of the European Union and the country code of Romania (RO). Between 1992-2007 the band featured the Romanian flag instead of the 12 stars. All lettering comes from the Latin alphabet.
A vehicle registration plate, also known as a number plate, license plate or licence plate, is a metal or plastic plate or plates attached to a motor vehicle or trailer for official identification purposes. The registration identifier is a numeric or alphanumeric code that uniquely identifies the vehicle within the issuing authority's database. In Europe most countries have adopted a format for registration plates that satisfies the requirements in the Vienna Convention on Road Traffic, which states that cross-border vehicles must display a distinguishing code for the country of registration on the rear of the vehicle. This sign may be an oval sticker placed separately from the registration plate, or may be incorporated into the plate. When the distinguishing sign is incorporated into the registration plate, it must also appear on the front plate of the vehicle, and may be supplemented with the flag or emblem of the national state, or the emblem of the regional economic integration organisation to which the country belongs. An example of such format is the common EU format, with the EU flag above the country code issued in EU member states.
Vehicle registration plates are mandatory number plates used to display the registration mark of a vehicle registered in France. They have existed in the country since 1901. It is compulsory for most motor vehicles used on public roads to display them.
Postal codes in Argentina are called códigos postales. Until 1998 Argentina employed a four-digit postal code for each municipality, with the first digit representing a region in the country, except in the case of the city of Buenos Aires. The unique codes became the base for the newer system, officially called CPA.
Standard Bulgarian vehicle registration plates display black glyphs on a white background, together with – on the left-hand side of the plate – a blue vertical "EU strip" showing the flag of Europe and, below it, the country code for Bulgaria: BG.
Vehicle registration plates are the mandatory number plates used to display the registration mark of a vehicle, and have existed in Russia for many decades. Most motor vehicles which are used on public roads are required by law to display them. Having a number plate obstructed by snow, mud, paper, or any other tool that makes any of the digits and letters illegible is considered an administrative offense and results in a fine.
The Portuguese vehicle registration plate system for automobiles and motorcycles is simple and sequential. The system has no link to geographical locations or similar. It is an incremental numbering system consisting of three groups of two characters, separated by dashes. This system started in 1937 with AA–10–00, which ran out on 29 February 1992. This then went on to 00–01–AA and changed to 00–AA–01 in 2005. This last sequence was exhausted early in 2020, and it was announced on 3 March that it had been replaced by the sequence AA–00–AA. Moreover, the letters W and Y, never before used, and the letter K, used only for a short-lived series for imported vehicles in 1997, are being employed in the new system, meaning that this sequence should last more than six-and-a-half times as long as the previous. At current rates that it would not need replacing at least until the end of the 21st century, but the expected lifetime of the series is stated as being forty-five years.
In Albania, vehicle registration plates are issued by the General Directory of Road Transport Services (DPSHTRR).
License plates of Honduras are issued by the Honduran Secretaría de Obras Públicas, Transporte y Vivienda and identify motor vehicles in the country.
Vehicle registration plates of Canada, also known as license plates, are issued by provincial or territorial government agencies. Registration plates in Canada are typically attached to motor vehicles or trailers for official identification purposes. Some Canadian registration plates have unique designs, shapes, and slogans related to the issuing jurisdiction. For example, registration plates issued in the Northwest Territories are shaped like a polar bear. In Alberta, registration plates typically display the words "Wild Rose Country."
The Canadian province of Alberta first required its residents to register their motor vehicles in 1906. Registrants provided their own licence plates for display until 1912, when the province began to issue plates. Only rear plates have been required since 1992.
Current motor vehicle registrations in Chile are officially known as Placa Patente Única (PPU). This denomination was introduced when unifying the license plate registries at the national level, where each vehicle would carry a unique license plate in the country, in 1985.
Current motor vehicle registrations in Bolivia, commonly known as plate, are license plates with a unique combination of letters and numbers to individually identify each vehicle registered in the country.
Since the end of the year 2000 Paraguay has required its residents to register their motor vehicles with the National Register of Vehicles and to display vehicle registration plates; this system has replaced the former one whereby plates were issued by municipal authorities, who also kept local registers.
Iranian license plates have had European standard dimensions since 2005. Each province in Iran has multiple unique, two-digit codes that are included at the right end of the license plates in a distinguished square outline, above which the word ایران or "Iran" has been written. A province's license plates will not be issued with a new code unless all possible combinations with the old code have been issued. In Tehran, the first code to be issued for the province was code 11, and subsequent codes all increased by 11 as well Ever since code 99 was fully issued, the new codes for Tehran have started from 10 and subsequently increased by 10. Most province codes increased by 10 based on the first code issued for their province. Khuzestan Province, for example, has been allocated codes 24 and 14, and code 24 will not be used before code 14 is fully issued. However, as codes started getting exhausted, numbers and letters have been assigned more liberally and without following this rule of thumb anymore
The Iraqi vehicle registration plate is a license plate used for official identification purposes for motor vehicles in Iraq.
Vehicle registration plates of Vietnam generally take the form DDL-DDDDD for vehicles. Standard license plates have black characters on white background. Front plates measure 47 × 11 cm, rear ones are 27 × 20. In 2020 and 2021, both plates measure 6 x 12. The current scheme for civilian vehicles omits the letters I, J, O, Q and W, with the letter R reserved for trailers, and includes the Vietnamese D.
Kyrgyz registration plates were first issued in 1980, when the country was still a republic of the Soviet Union. Despite having gained its independence in 1991, it continued to use the old Soviet plates until the introduction of the current format in 1994.
Vehicle registration plates of the Mercosur are a system under implementation in the Mercosur member states, regional bloc and intergovernmental organization founded in 1991.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
