Free car tools.
Check any car by its registration: its MOT history, what its tax costs, whether clean air zones would charge it, what its MOT advisories mean and if it has a cambelt or a timing chain. Read the year from a number plate, and see how to pay less for insurance.
Type a reg for the full car check, or pick a tool below.
Our car tools
- By reg
Free car check
MOT history, the mileage at every test, MOT and tax dates, safety recalls, CO2 and more.
Check a car - By reg or fuel and year
Clean air zone and ULEZ checker
Which UK zones would charge a car, how much and when: London’s ULEZ, Birmingham, Bristol, Oxford and Scotland.
Check the zones - By reg or V5C
Car tax checker
What a car’s tax costs now, for 12 or 6 months or by monthly Direct Debit, at the rates from GOV.UK.
Check the tax - By reg and settlement figure
Finance check
Owe more than your car is worth? How selling a car on finance works, and a price that shows what you’d get after we settle it.
Check my finance - By reg
MOT advisories explained
What each item on a car’s latest MOT means, and when the MOT manual makes it a fail.
Explain an MOT - By reg or make
Cambelt or timing chain?
Whether an engine has a cambelt, a wet belt or a timing chain, with the maker’s own interval where we have it.
Check an engine - By plate
What year is my number plate?
The year from any current-style plate, every plate since 2001, and when the next change is.
Check a plate - Guide
Cheaper car insurance
When to buy, how to compare, honest ways to pay less, and the shortcuts that can leave you with no cover.
Read the guide
Buying or moving a car?
The Used Car Buyers is part of The Drivers Gallery Ltd, with a showroom and a vehicle transport team.
Questions people ask
Are the car tools free?
Yes. Every tool on this page is free to use, with nothing to sign up for.
Where does the information come from?
The car check and the MOT look-up use the official DVSA MOT record and DVLA’s vehicle record. The car tax checker uses GOV.UK’s rate tables, and the clean air zone checker each zone’s own official rules, with DVLA’s record for the car. The cambelt checker uses manufacturers’ own published schedules, and the plate checker uses DVLA’s guide to registration numbers. The insurance guide names the source of every figure.
What happens to the registration I type?
We use it only to look up the car on the official records, and we don’t ask who you are.
More guides: Guides for selling your car · How selling to us works · Areas we cover
Selling your car?
Most cars get a price online in a couple of minutes.