Is My Car Taxed? Check, Costs, SORN, and Penalties

To find out whether your car is taxed, go to gov.uk/check-vehicle-tax and enter the registration number. The free service shows immediately whether the vehicle is currently taxed, when the tax runs out, or whether it has been declared off the road with a SORN.¹ No login or account is needed, so you can use it for your own car or for one you are thinking of buying.

One thing to watch: if you have just taxed the vehicle or filed a SORN, records can take up to two working days to update. A check straight after paying may not yet show the new status.

What the Check Result Means

The service returns one of three answers. Either the car is taxed, with an expiry date shown; or it has a valid SORN, meaning it has been declared off the road; or it is untaxed and has no SORN, which is the situation that carries a penalty.²

If you want to see the tax rates that apply to your specific vehicle rather than just the status, you’ll need the 11-digit reference from your V5C logbook to run the extended check.¹

What to Do If the Car Is Not Taxed

If the check shows no tax and no SORN, you need to act before driving or even parking the vehicle on a public road. You have two choices: tax it, or declare it off the road.

Tax the Vehicle

You can tax a car online, by phone on 0300 123 4321, or at a Post Office. Online is fastest. To do it you need one of three reference numbers: the 11-digit number from your V5C logbook, the 16-digit number from a V11 reminder letter, or the reference on the green V5C/2 “new keeper” slip if you have just bought the car.³⁴

Before payment goes through, the system checks that the vehicle has a valid MOT (where required) and active insurance. A new MOT result can take up to two days to appear in the database, so you may need to wait a short while after a test before you can tax the car.⁴

Lost your logbook and don’t have a reminder? A replacement V5C costs £25 and usually arrives within five to seven working days.⁵

Paying for a full 12 months in one go is cheapest. Six-monthly or monthly Direct Debit adds a 5% surcharge, and that surcharge is not refunded if you later cancel the tax.⁶⁷

Declare It Off the Road (SORN)

If the car is not going to be used, you can file a Statutory Off Road Notification. A SORN removes the requirement to have tax or insurance on the vehicle, but it also means the car cannot legally be on a public road at all. The only exception is driving to or from a pre-booked MOT test. Using a SORN’d vehicle on the road for any other reason can attract a court fine of up to £2,500.⁸

A SORN stays in force until you tax the vehicle, sell it, scrap it, or export it. You can file one online using the same reference numbers you would use to tax the car.

How Much Vehicle Tax Costs

Vehicle excise duty depends on when the car was first registered and its CO2 emissions. Most cars are on a two-stage system: a first-year rate based on emissions, then a flat standard rate from year two onwards.

For cars first registered on or after 1 April 2025, the first-year rate runs from £10 for zero-emission vehicles up to £5,490 for petrol cars emitting over 255 g/km CO2. Diesels that do not meet the RDE2 standard pay a higher first-year rate at every band.⁹

From year two, all cars registered after 1 April 2017 pay the same standard rate of £195 a year, whether petrol, diesel, hybrid, or fully electric.⁹ Paying that £195 monthly by Direct Debit works out at £204.75 over the year because of the 5% surcharge.

Expensive Car Supplement

If the car’s list price when new was above £40,000, an extra £425 a year is added to the standard rate for five years, starting from the second year of tax. Total annual cost during those five years is £620. The supplement is based on the original list price, so a used car bought cheaply still attracts it if the manufacturer’s list price exceeded the threshold.⁹

Electric Cars

Fully electric cars paid no vehicle tax until 1 April 2025. Since then, a new electric car pays £10 in year one and the £195 standard rate from year two. Electric vehicles registered on or after 1 April 2025 with a list price above £40,000 also pay the £425 expensive car supplement for five years from year two. Electric cars registered before 1 April 2025 pay the £195 standard rate but are not subject to the supplement.¹⁰

Cars That Are Exempt but Still Need Taxing

Some vehicles have a zero rate, which means the cost is nothing, but you still have to complete the tax process every year. The main categories are vehicles used by people receiving certain disability benefits such as the higher-rate mobility component of Personal Independence Payment, vehicles used to carry disabled passengers who meet the criteria, and historic vehicles built before 1 January 1985 (or first registered before 8 January 1985 if the build date is unknown).¹¹

Skipping the annual application is a common mistake with exempt vehicles. Without it, the car shows as untaxed on the DVLA database, and the same penalties apply as for any other untaxed vehicle.¹¹

Penalties for an Untaxed Car

The registered keeper is legally responsible for keeping the vehicle taxed or under a SORN.¹² Enforcement runs in stages.

DVLA sends an automatic £80 late licensing penalty when a vehicle appears untaxed on its register. Paying within 33 days halves it to £40. Unpaid, the case can be referred to a magistrates’ court, where the maximum fine is £1,000.² An untaxed vehicle spotted on a public road can also be clamped and removed to a pound by DVLA’s contractor or the police.¹²

The £80 penalty applies even to a car parked on a driveway if it is neither taxed nor covered by a SORN.⁸ Enforcement doesn’t rely on being pulled over. DVLA’s digital register combined with police ANPR cameras can flag an untaxed vehicle during normal traffic flow, and the penalty follows without any direct contact from an officer.

Checking a Car You’re About to Buy

Vehicle tax does not transfer with the car. Any tax the previous owner had paid is automatically cancelled once DVLA is notified of the sale, and full remaining months are refunded to the seller.⁷ You, as the new keeper, must tax the vehicle yourself before driving it on a public road, or declare a SORN if you plan to keep it off the road.¹³

The green V5C/2 slip from the seller’s logbook lets you tax the car on the spot while you wait for your own V5C to arrive. Running the free check on the registration first is worthwhile: a car under a SORN cannot legally be driven home from the sale, so you’d need to tax it before setting off, or arrange transport.

1
GOV.UK. Check If a Vehicle Is Taxed
2
GOV.UK. DVLA Enforcement of Vehicle Tax, Registration and Insurance Offences
3
GOV.UK. Tax Your Vehicle Without a Vehicle Tax Reminder
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GOV.UK. Tax Your Vehicle
5
GOV.UK. Get a Vehicle Log Book (V5C)
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GOV.UK. Vehicle Tax Direct Debit Payments
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GOV.UK. Cancel Your Vehicle Tax and Get a Refund
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GOV.UK. When You Need to Make a SORN
9
GOV.UK. V149 Rates of Vehicle Tax (April 2025)
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GOV.UK. Vehicle Tax for Electric, Zero and Low Emission Vehicles
11
GOV.UK. Historic (Classic) Vehicles: MOT and Vehicle Tax – Eligibility
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GOV.UK. Vehicle Enforcement Policy
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GOV.UK. Tell DVLA You’ve Sold, Transferred or Bought a Vehicle