BANNED: the NSFW 76-reg number plates DVLA brands too rude for the road

With all the doom and gloom in the news, we at Auto Express thought people might need a bit of cheering up. With this in mind, we’ve managed to get our hands on the official list of new 76-plate banned car registrations – in other words, all the number plates the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) deems too rude to be used on the road.

Every March and September, the DVLA issues a new combination of letters and numbers, featuring the latest ‘age identifier’ number. Cars registered in March use the last two digits of the year, so earlier this year it was 26. In September, however, 50 is added to that previous number to represent the halfway point in the 12-month cycle, resulting in 76 being the new number for September 2026.

Now, some numerical combinations can look like letters with only a bit of imagination and squinting, leading to some hilarious results; for example, the ‘7’ in ‘76’ can look rather like an ‘r’ or a T’, leading to somewhat inappropriate registrations like ‘AA76 RSE’, or ‘EA76 POO’. 

The DVLA holds two meetings per year, which must be very interesting events, to ensure no number plates go into circulation that “may cause offence, embarrassment or are in poor taste”. With this in mind, we’re sure you can understand why the likes of ‘RU76 UKR’ and ‘HH76 TLR’ are on the DVLA’s banned list for this latest registration change.

Regardless, in the spirit of fun (and also because many of these plates are genuinely rude and offensive), we’ve listed the latest full batch of banned plates below.

The UK’s banned ‘76’ car number plates

You can find a full list of banned 76-plate combinations below, so we’ll leave it to you to choose any individual favourites. Please note that some of these are more explicit than those we’ve picked out above and may cause offence or distress.

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