The purpose of this page is to help identify the various plates issued by North Carolina that are currently on the road. I urge you to explore this page and familiarize yourself with the plates and their sequences of letters and numbers. You never know when this information can be useful.
First in Flight Regular PassengerThe First in Flight base has been on the roads of North Carolina since 1982. Early plates had either 5 or 6 digits until 1986 when the current 7 digit numbers started. All plates have had a constant 3 letter prefix. Below are some things to look for when identifying these plates which can help to make remembering a number easier.
Letter CombinationsCurrently, only the 7 digit plates are on the road. The oldest plates can be identified by the letter combination or prefix. In 2008, NCDMV replaced all of the 5 & 6 digit plates along with all 7-digit plates up to prefix JZZ. In 2010, the K series was replaced. So currently the oldest plates are the L series. With all plates starting with L and continuing on through Z, the second letter is N through Z. So the oldest plates would have a prefix of LNA and would continue to LZZ, then MNA through MZZ, etc. In 2011, when ZZZ series was issued, the prefixes started with AAA with the second letter now being A through M. So now the sequence goes AAA-AMZ, BAA through BMZ, etc.
Two prefixes have been recalled after having been issued- WTF and XXX.
Number ColorFirst in Flight plates have had 2 colors for numbers. The plates used blue through the early WTF prefix when it was changed to red for reasons unknown in 2007 and issuance began in July of that year. The red letters continued through the ZND prefix and was changed back to blue with the ZNE prefix and continues on through today. To recap the number colors-
LNA-1001 through WTF-1500
WTF-1501 through ZND-9999
ZNE-1001 through current H series