Plain-English guides to checking a used car before you buy — from MOT history and mileage to write-offs, outstanding finance and your rights as a buyer.
Check the actual vehicle
Enter its registration to check the official tax, MOT and mileage record free. If you need provenance for a purchase or ownership decision, add finance, stolen and write-off checks.
Free: vehicle identity, tax/SORN, MOT history, mileage and buyer red flags.
Full history: adds outstanding finance, stolen, insurance write-off and other paid provenance checks.
The full report is optional. Review the free official record first if you are unsure. Payment is completed securely on the next screen.
What a car check covers, and which checks actually matter before you buy.
How to view, test-drive and inspect a used car — and the red flags to walk from.
Where you stand if a used car turns out to be faulty or misdescribed.
Signs of odometer tampering and how MOT mileage history reveals it.
Why finance owed on a car can follow it to a new owner, and how to check.
What Cat A, B, S and N mean and what each tells you about a used car.
How stolen-vehicle markers work and what to do before you hand over money.
Every guide ends at the same place: the registration in front of you. These checks are free and need no account.
MOT status, expiry and every recorded test with advisories and mileage.
Taxed, untaxed or SORN, the tax due date and an estimated cost.
Every MOT mileage reading, with drops and unit switches flagged.
Whether a vehicle is declared off the road, and what that means for a buyer.
Manufacturer service records, charged only when records are found.
Official statistics on how a model fares at MOT, and how many are still on the road.
Short, focused answers to common used-car questions.
What an MOT advisory means, how it differs from a minor defect, which advisories are cheap and which are expensive, and what a repeated advisory tells you about a used car.
A logbook issued weeks before a sale is common and usually innocent — but it is worth a question. Why DVLA reissues a V5C, what it cannot prove, and the checks that take two minutes.
A marked-for-export car is one DVLA has been told is leaving the UK permanently. What the marker means, why it appears on a car still for sale here, and what to check before you pay.
A reading lower than the one before it does not prove clocking. The innocent explanations, the evidence that settles it, and what to do if the seller cannot explain the gap.
The questions that actually reveal something — about ownership, finance, history and why they are selling — plus the answers that should end the conversation.
A SORN car is one the keeper declared off the road. What that means for viewing it, getting it home, taxing it and what to inspect after months of standing still.
No — with one exception: driving to or from a pre-arranged MOT test or a garage for repairs. The fines, what it does to your insurance, and why you cannot tax it either.
Yes, buying one is legal — driving it home usually is not. How to get a car with no MOT home lawfully, why the test lapsed, what it signals, and what to check before you pay.
The V5C checks that take two minutes: the DVL watermark, the stolen serial-number ranges, VIN and engine number, keeper details — and what a logbook does not prove.