MOT History Check - Check MOT History by Reg
View the complete MOT testing record for any UK vehicle. Every pass, every fail, every advisory — dating back to 2005. Enter a registration number to see the full timeline.
There is no MOT grace period. The day after expiry you are already driving illegally.
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What MOT History Reveals
Every annual MOT test creates a permanent record. Here is what you can learn from a vehicle's testing timeline.
Every Test Since 2005
Access the complete chronological record of MOT tests. See which years the vehicle passed first time, which years it failed, and how quickly failures were rectified.
Mileage Over Time
Odometer readings are recorded at every MOT. Plot the mileage trajectory year-by-year and catch suspicious jumps or drops that suggest the odometer has been tampered with.
Advisory Progression
Track how advisories evolve over time. An advisory that appears in three consecutive tests tells you the owner never addressed it — a red flag for overall maintenance.
Testing Gaps
Gaps in the MOT timeline may indicate periods where the vehicle was off the road, declared SORN, or potentially driven without a valid certificate.
Failure Trends
Identify components that fail repeatedly across tests — brakes, suspension, emissions. Recurring failures on the same system point to a chronic underlying issue.
Lifetime Pass Rate
See the overall pass/fail ratio at a glance. A vehicle that has failed more than half its MOTs has likely had a harder life than its cosmetic condition suggests.
How to Use MOT History When Buying
Smart buyers cross-reference MOT history with the seller's claims. Here is what to look for.
Compare mileage to the listing
If the advert says 60,000 miles but the last MOT recorded 75,000 — something is wrong. MOT mileage is the most reliable evidence of true usage.
Check for repeat advisories
The same advisory appearing at every test (e.g. corroded brake pipe) suggests the owner patches the minimum to pass rather than maintaining properly.
Look at first-time pass rate
A vehicle that consistently passes on the first attempt has likely been well maintained. Multiple retests each year suggest ongoing neglect.
Note testing gaps
A 2-year gap might mean SORN (legitimate) or it might mean the vehicle was written off and repaired. Ask the seller to explain any gaps.
Advisory, Minor, Major, Dangerous — What They Actually Mean
Since 20 May 2018 every defect a tester records carries one of five labels, and only two of them fail the car. These are the definitions GOV.UK publishes, word for word — worth reading because the difference between a “minor” and a “major” is the difference between a pass and a fail, and both appear on a history in the same grey type.
| Label | What GOV.UK says it means | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Dangerous | A direct and immediate risk to road safety or has a serious impact on the environment. Do not drive the vehicle until it’s been repaired. | Fail |
| Major | It may affect the vehicle’s safety, put other road users at risk or have an impact on the environment. Repair it immediately. | Fail |
| Minor | No significant effect on the safety of the vehicle or impact on the environment. Repair as soon as possible. | Pass |
| Advisory | It could become more serious in the future. Monitor and repair it if necessary. | Pass |
| Pass | It meets the minimum legal standard. Make sure it continues to meet the standard. | Pass |
A pass with defects is still a pass
Minor defects and advisories both sit on a passing certificate. A history entry showing eleven advisories and a pass is not a near-miss — it is a car whose owner was told about eleven things and legally allowed to drive away. The question is what happened at the next test.
A fail is a refusal, not a certificate
The document issued after a fail is a refusal of an MOT test certificate. It is why a failed test still appears in the history with a full defect list: the record is created either way, and the defect text is the tester’s own wording.
Dangerous stops the car dead
GOV.UK: you can be fined up to £2,500, be banned from driving and get 3 penalty points for driving a vehicle that has failed its MOT because of a ‘dangerous’ problem. A dangerous entry in a history tells you the car was, on that day, undriveable in law.
For the question on its own terms — where the line falls, and what a tester is deciding when they pick one label over another — the advisory vs failure guide goes further than a history page needs to.
How to Read the Mileage Sequence
The odometer is read and typed in by the tester at every test, so an MOT history is a series of timestamped mileage snapshots nobody can retrospectively edit. Read as a sequence rather than as individual numbers, it is the most useful thing on the page.
A reading lower than the one before it
Mileage does not go backwards. Our clocking check flags a drop only when it exceeds 50 miles, because anything smaller is almost always a mis-keyed digit rather than fraud. Above that floor, a fall between two consecutive tests is the classic rollback signature — and it is worth asking about even when the seller has a plausible answer, because a replaced instrument cluster and a rolled-back one look identical in the data.
A jump too large to have been driven
The opposite tell. Our check treats sustained travel above 100,000 miles per year between two tests as implausible and flags it for review rather than as fraud — the usual cause is a transposed digit at the keyboard (a 90,000 typed as 190,000), and a later corrected reading confirms it. It matters because one inflated reading in the middle of a series can mask a genuine rollback either side of it.
A switch between miles and kilometres
The DVSA record stores a unit alongside every reading, and an import or a cluster swap can flip a car from miles to kilometres mid-history. Read raw, that looks like the mileage suddenly leapt 60%, or fell by 40% when it flips back. Our check normalises kilometres to miles before comparing any two readings, precisely so a unit change is not mistaken for clocking — and so that clocking across a unit change is not silently missed.
A flat or barely-moving stretch
Two or three tests almost the same distance apart is exactly what an honest low-mileage car looks like. Two or three tests within a few hundred miles of each other is a car that sat still — which is fine if you wanted a garaged weekend car, and expensive if you wanted one with fresh brakes and supple bushes. Standing still is a different kind of wear, not an absence of it.
The number in the advert, against the last test
The single highest-value comparison, and the one that takes ten seconds. If the last MOT recorded 96,000 miles eight months ago and the advert says 71,000, there is no innocent explanation that does not involve the odometer. The MOT figure is evidence; the advert is a claim.
Every one of those tests runs automatically on the report. The clocking check returns a named verdict over the whole series — and reports indicators to verify, never a definitive accusation, because the MOT record cannot distinguish a rolled-back odometer from a replaced one.
Repeat Defects, Escalations and Gaps in Testing
One bad test tells you about one day. A pattern across several tells you about an owner.
The same component failing twice
Our failure-pattern check counts a component as recurring when it caused a failure in two or more separate tests — brakes, suspension, steering, exhaust, lighting, corrosion. Once is a wear item. Twice is either a fault that was never properly fixed or a car being run to the minimum standard each year and no further.
An advisory that became a failure
The escalation pattern: a component noted as an advisory at one test and failed on at a later one. That sequence is documentary proof the owner was warned in writing and did nothing until the car was refused a certificate. It is the strongest maintenance signal in the free record, and it is invisible unless you read the tests in order.
The same advisory, year after year
An advisory repeated at three consecutive tests without ever escalating is a slightly different story — usually surface corrosion or a weeping shock absorber that a tester keeps noting and nobody ever addresses. It rarely stops the car passing. It does tell you what the next owner will be paying for.
Corrosion is the one to take seriously
Our check flags corrosion separately from other recurring faults for a reason: a bulb is a bulb, but structural corrosion on a monocoque tends to be progressive, expensive and, past a point, terminal. An advisory for corrosion on a car that is going to be kept another five years is a different purchase from one that is going to be sold on next year.
A gap before the third year is normal
The first MOT is not due until the third anniversary of registration, so a three-year hole at the start of every history is the law working correctly, not a missing record.
A gap later on is a question, not an answer
A missing year usually means the vehicle was off the road and declared SORN — a project, a second car, an inheritance, a long repair. It can also mean an owner simply did not test it. The DVSA record does not store a reason, and nothing in it distinguishes those cases, so treat a gap as something to ask about and cross-reference with the mileage on either side: a two-year gap with 400 miles added says stored, and one with 30,000 miles added says something else entirely.
Both patterns are scored automatically on the failure history check, which returns the lifetime pass rate alongside the recurring and escalating components rather than making you read for them.
What a Clean MOT History Does Not Prove
A full set of first-time passes is genuinely good news. It is also a narrower piece of evidence than it looks, and knowing the edges of it is what stops a buyer over-trusting it.
It is a snapshot, not a warranty
The MOT tests a defined list of items against the minimum legal standard on one day. A car can pass in the morning and develop a fault that afternoon, and a pass says nothing about the day after the test.
It never looks at the engine, gearbox or clutch
None of them are MOT items. A car with a slipping clutch, a rattling timing chain or a gearbox on its way out will pass its MOT without comment, because the test is about roadworthiness and emissions, not mechanical health.
It is not a service history
Nothing in the DVSA record shows whether the oil was ever changed. A perfect MOT history and no service book is a common and slightly uncomfortable combination — the first proves the car met the legal standard each year, the second is what proves it was looked after between those days.
It does not show accident damage, write-offs or theft
The MOT record contains no insurance write-off category, no salvage record, no police stolen marker and no outstanding-finance status. Those come from licensed databases we do not hold and do not sell. A repaired write-off with straight panels passes MOTs exactly like any other car, so if that is your question, the honest answer is that this check is not the tool for it — use an HPI-style provider.
It cannot tell you where the car lived
The DVSA record we receive carries the date, the result, the mileage, the test number and the defect text. It does not carry the test centre or its location, so no inference about the car’s home region or a suspicious change of area can be drawn from it here. Any site presenting that as a buying signal is using data this record does not contain.
A gap is not evidence of anything on its own
It is the absence of a record, not the presence of one. Read alongside the mileage either side of it, it becomes informative; read alone, it is noise.
What the Next Test Will Cost
The history tells you what has happened. These are the rules that govern what happens next, and they are the ones most often got wrong.
£54.85 is a ceiling, not a price
GOV.UK sets the maximum fee for a car at £54.85 and for a standard motorcycle at £29.65. Garages may charge less and frequently do — the figure is a legal cap, so a quote at the cap is simply a garage choosing not to discount.
Testing early costs you nothing
You can get an MOT up to a month minus a day before the current one runs out and keep the existing expiry date. There is no advantage to waiting and no grace period afterwards — driving without a valid MOT is a fine of up to £1,000.
Leave it at the garage and the retest is free
If you leave the vehicle at the test centre for repair and it is retested within 10 working days, GOV.UK says there is no fee for that partial retest. Take it away for repair and bring it back inside 10 working days and you can be charged a partial retest fee.
Miss the window and you pay in full again
In all other cases it is a full retest at the full fee. A small set of items — lamps, mirrors, wipers, registration plates, doors, wheels and tyres among them — get a free partial retest if the vehicle is back before the end of the next working day.
The full breakdown — what garages actually charge, why the cap exists, and where the money goes on a fail — is in the MOT costs guide.
Which MOT check do you need?
“MOT check” means four different things depending on what you are trying to find out. All four are free.
“What has this car been through?”
You are on the right page. The full MOT history — every test since 2005, every advisory, every recorded mileage.
“Is the MOT valid right now?”
That is a status question, not a history one. Use the MOT checker for the current result and the exact expiry date.
“Has the mileage been tampered with?”
The odometer reading is captured at every MOT, so the test record is the evidence trail. The mileage check reads that trail and returns a clocking verdict.
“How often has it failed?”
A one-off fail on a bulb is noise; the same component failing three years running is not. The failure history check separates the two.
MOT History Check — FAQ
Answers to common questions about checking MOT history online.
How do I check MOT history?
Where can I check a car's MOT history online for free?
Can I check a car's previous MOT results?
How far back does MOT history go?
Can I see old MOT results?
What can MOT history tell me about a used car?
How do I read an MOT history report?
What does an advisory on an MOT mean, and is a minor defect a fail?
What does a gap in a car's MOT history mean?
Can I see which garage tested the car?
How much does an MOT cost, and is the retest free?
Is MOT history the same as a full vehicle history check?
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- Driving without a valid MOT is a fine of up to £1,000.
- Most UK insurers require a valid MOT — driving without one can invalidate your cover.
- You can test up to one calendar month minus a day early and keep your existing expiry date — testing early costs you nothing.
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MOT test records come from the DVSA MOT history service. The defect category definitions are quoted from GOV.UK, and the MOT fee, retest and testing-deadline rules on this page are GOV.UK’s published figures. Mileage and failure-pattern thresholds are our own detection logic and are described exactly as implemented. Last updated: August 2026.