Transparency
Data sources
Every figure on UK Motoring comes from one of the datasets below. Each entry lists who publishes it, how we get it, how often it changes, its licence and anything worth knowing when you use it.
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Vehicle licensing statistics
Department for Transport
- Access
- Statistical release
- Updated
- Quarterly (July, September, December), annual in May
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
- Publisher’s page
- www.gov.uk/government/collections/vehicles-statistics
Make and model counts come from the data files df_VEH0120_GB/UK (licensed and SORN stock) and df_VEH0160_GB/UK (first registrations). The latest quarter we use is Q1 2026, published 15 July 2026. Model-year survival (how many 2014 Ford Fiestas are left) comes from df_VEH0124_AM and df_VEH0124_NZ: licensed and SORN vehicles at each year end from 2014 by make, model and year of first use, covering the United Kingdom (including Northern Ireland), latest year end 2025. Local figures come from tables VEH0105 (licensed vehicles by body type, fuel and keepership by local authority) and VEH0142 (plug-in vehicles by local authority), and neighbourhood figures from df_VEH0125 and df_VEH0145 (by LSOA).
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Anonymised MOT tests and results
Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency
- Access
- Bulk download
- Updated
- Annual
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
- Publisher’s page
- open.data.dvsa.gov.uk/mot-anonymised/index.html
Test-level records with make, model, first-use date, mileage, colour, fuel, the test station postcode area and defect items. We use them for model pages, model years, specific defects and advisories, the reliability ranking, postcode areas and car colours. The latest year we use is 2025, published by DVSA on 22 June 2026.
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Road traffic statistics (AADF by count point)
Department for Transport
- Access
- Bulk download
- Updated
- Annual (2025 data published 20 May 2026)
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
- Publisher’s page
- roadtraffic.dft.gov.uk/downloads
We use the annual average daily flow (AADF) file (every count point, 2000 to 2025), the council area traffic file (all roads, from 1993) and the major road database (MRDB 2025), which draws each count point link between junctions. Traffic figures are DfT estimates: in a given year many links are estimated from earlier counts rather than counted.
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Road safety open data (STATS19)
Department for Transport
- Access
- Bulk download
- Updated
- Annual, with provisional mid-year figures
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
- Publisher’s page
- www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/road-safety-open-data
Police-reported personal injury collisions on public roads in Great Britain. We use the collision, vehicle and casualty files for the last five years (2021 to 2025) and the 2025 data guide for code lists. Serious and slight figures are DfT’s adjusted estimates, which allow for police forces moving to injury-based reporting.
- Record-level data. We publish aggregates only, and withhold any count of one or two below Great Britain level.
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Fuel Finder open data
Fuel Finder statutory scheme
- Access
- API
- Updated
- Near real time; we take a snapshot of every forecourt twice a day
- Licence
- Fuel Finder open data terms
Every UK forecourt must report its prices within 30 minutes of a change under the Motor Fuel Price (Open Data) Regulations 2025. The scheme is enforced by the Competition and Markets Authority. We use forecourt details and current prices for every grade (E10, E5, B7, premium diesel, B10 and HVO); averages use E10 and B7.
- Prices are a snapshot taken twice a day, and forecourts can change them at any time: always check the price at the pump.
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Weekly road fuel prices
Department for Energy Security and Net Zero
- Access
- Statistical release
- Updated
- Weekly (Tuesdays)
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
- Publisher’s page
- www.gov.uk/government/statistics/weekly-road-fuel-prices
UK average pump prices for ultra low sulphur unleaded petrol and diesel, with duty and VAT rates, every week since 9 June 2003. Each Monday a panel of fuel companies reports that day’s prices, and the average is weighted by their annual sales (when the method was last documented, four oil companies and two supermarkets, covering about 65% of the market). Files used: the 2003 to 2017 and 2018 onwards CSVs.
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ONS Postcode Directory
Office for National Statistics
- Access
- Bulk download
- Updated
- Quarterly (February, May, August, November)
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
Used to place filling stations in their council area, and to find the centre of a postcode district for the fuel finder and fuel price emails (August 2026 edition).
- Great Britain only. Northern Ireland postcode locations are licensed separately, so for Northern Ireland we estimate the centre of each postcode district from the filling stations in it.
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Electric vehicle public charging infrastructure statistics
Department for Transport
- Access
- Statistical release
- Updated
- Quarterly
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
Device counts are based on Zapmap data. The National Chargepoint Registry closed on 28 November 2024; operators now publish their own open data feeds under the 2023 regulations. Tables used: EVCI0101 (regions and nations, from January 2025), EVCI0102 (local authorities, from January 2026) and EVCI0201 (power bands). Latest seen: 1 July 2026, published 27 August 2026.
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EV charging stations (amenity=charging_station), United Kingdom
OpenStreetMap contributors
- Access
- API
- Updated
- Daily
- Publisher’s page
- www.openstreetmap.org/copyright
Public charging stations only (private, staff and residents-only sites and chargers for bicycles or scooters are left out). Coverage and detail depend on volunteers: many stations have no connector types or power recorded. Used for the charger finder and map.
- Share-alike: the chargers file we publish is derived from OpenStreetMap, so it is available under the ODbL too.
- Attribution to OpenStreetMap contributors wherever the data is shown.
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Charging locations, United Kingdom (open-licensed records)
Open Charge Map contributors
- Access
- API
- Updated
- Daily
- Publisher’s page
- openchargemap.org
Public, operational sites only. Used with OpenStreetMap for the charger finder and map, where the two are combined.
- Only records Open Charge Map marks as openly licensed are used (opendata=true); its other records are copyright to the operators that supplied them.
- Share-alike: our Open Charge Map file is published separately from the OpenStreetMap one and under CC BY-SA 4.0.
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Driving test and theory test data (DRT tables)
Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency
- Access
- Statistical release
- Updated
- Monthly and quarterly; test-centre tables (DRT122) annual
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
Tables used: DRT122A (car pass rates by centre, month and gender), DRT122C (first attempts), DRT121F (top 10 faults), DRT121D (practical tests by attempt), DRT111A to DRT111C (theory tests by quarter, month, gender and age) and DRT112A (theory pass rates by centre), Great Britain, 2007/08 onwards. Updated 18 September 2026.
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Mid-year population estimates
Office for National Statistics
- Access
- Statistical release
- Updated
- Annual
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
File used: mye24tablesuk.xlsx (mid-2024 estimates for every UK local authority, county, region and nation; population since mid-2011, by age, area and median age).
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Vehicle safety recalls
Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency
- Access
- Bulk download
- Updated
- Updated as recalls are added; no schedule stated
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
- Publisher’s page
- www.check-vehicle-recalls.service.gov.uk
File used: RecallsFile.csv ("All recalls since 1992"), one row per recall and model. We use road vehicle recalls (numbers starting R/: cars, vans, trucks and buses) whose model names match a car model in the DVLA licensing data, and publish the concern, defect, remedy, vehicles affected and build dates. Vehicle identification numbers are not published. The latest recall in our copy was launched on 14 September 2026.
- DVSA says the data comes from manufacturers and may be delayed or incomplete. Owners should check a specific vehicle on GOV.UK or with the manufacturer.
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Transport Data Feeds (DATEX II)
National Highways
- Access
- API
- Updated
- Near real time
- Publisher’s page
- developer.data.nationalhighways.co.uk
Planned road and lane closures, read twice a day. Closures that have finished can stay in the feed for up to seven days, so we check the end time ourselves. We show planned closures, not unplanned incidents: those change minute by minute, faster than our pages are updated.
- England’s strategic road network only: the motorways and trunk A-roads National Highways manages, not council roads.
- Provided as is, with no guarantee of accuracy: closures can change after we read them.
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Scottish Road Works Register open data
Scottish Road Works Commissioner
- Access
- Bulk download
- Updated
- Daily (extracted overnight)
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
- Publisher’s page
- roadworks.scot/opendata
File used: the disruptions export (CurrentActivities.csv), a daily extract of road works, events and permissions recorded in the Scottish Road Works Register, with the street, council, promoter, dates, traffic management and a point location. We publish counts and the most disruptive current works per council and per road; potential works are left out.
- Scotland only. England and Wales publish roadworks separately.
- A daily extract, not a live feed: works can start, finish or change after it is taken.
- Descriptions, dates and traffic management are recorded by the promoter of the works.
- The Register says it does not guarantee the files are free of errors.
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Car fuel and emissions information
Vehicle Certification Agency
- Access
- Bulk download
- Updated
- A running "latest" file, plus yearly guide snapshots
- Licence
- Crown copyright
- Publisher’s page
- carfueldata.vehicle-certification-agency.gov.uk
Snapshots from July 2000 to 15 September 2026. NEDC test figures to September 2018, WLTP from the 2019 guide; the two are never compared. We publish combined mpg, CO2 and Euro standard, not other pollutants.
- VCA: figures are official laboratory test results and may not be achieved in real-world driving.
- VCA: type-approval figures should not be used to rank vehicles with similar figures.
- VCA: other pollutant figures should only be compared between cars of the same Euro standard.
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Tyre Safety Month 2026 research: Act Before You REact
TyreSafe
- Access
- Statistical release
- Updated
- One-off survey, fieldwork 24 to 28 April 2026
- Licence
- Supplied by TyreSafe for editorial use
Survey answers about how drivers rate themselves and when they last checked their tyres. Kept separate from official casualty and MOT statistics, which measure different things: the survey cannot show that a tyre defect caused an incident.
- Opinium: local samples below 50 respondents are indicative only and need a qualification.
- No significance tests or margins of error were supplied, so regional differences are descriptive only.
- A near miss is self-reported, not a police-recorded collision, and the survey does not establish its cause.
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Criminal Justice System statistics: Outcomes by Offence
Ministry of Justice
- Access
- Statistical release
- Updated
- Quarterly, with an annual edition in May
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
- Publisher’s page
- www.gov.uk/government/collections/criminal-justice-statistics
Court outcomes for motoring offences: how many were convicted, fined and disqualified, and the average fine. A conviction count is not a count of offences, and it reflects how much enforcement a force does as well as how much offending there is.
- Convictions are counted at the court that sentenced the case, not where the offence happened or where the driver lives.
- England and Wales only.
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Police Powers and Procedures: fixed penalty notices and other outcomes
Home Office
- Access
- Statistical release
- Updated
- Annual
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
What police did about an offence: a fixed penalty, a court referral or another outcome. Seizures under section 165A are not in it; the Home Office confirmed in November 2025 that it does not collect those centrally.
- Counts notices and outcomes recorded by police, which is a different measure from court convictions and will not match it.
- England and Wales only.
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Derived statistics
UK Motoring
- Access
- Derived
- Updated
- With each upstream refresh
- Licence
- See methodology
- Publisher’s page
- /methodology
Figures we calculate from the sources above. Each has a documented method.