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 any limits on how we can use it.
Checked: URL and licence confirmed against the publisher’s own pages. Awaiting confirmation: something material, usually the reuse licence, still needs written confirmation before we publish live figures from it.
- Checked
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). Latest seen: 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).
- Awaiting confirmation
Vehicle Enquiry Service API
Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency
- Access
- API
- Updated
- Real time, per request
- Publisher’s page
- developer-portal.driver-vehicle-licensing.api.gov.uk
Tax status, MOT status and vehicle details by registration. Not connected.
- New API registrations are closed while DVLA upgrades its systems (checked 13 September 2026).
- One API key per organisation.
- DVLA must be told within 24 hours of any data loss or misuse, and can audit use.
- The terms do not say how long responses may be stored. Confirm with DVLA before caching.
- Checked
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 DVSA portal has 2025 data (updated 22 June 2026); data.gov.uk lags a year behind.
- Awaiting confirmation
MOT History API
Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency
- Access
- API
- Updated
- Real time, plus weekly bulk file and daily updates
- Licence
- Licence to be confirmed
- Publisher’s page
- documentation.history.mot.api.gov.uk
Per-vehicle MOT history by registration. Needs registration and credentials. Not connected.
- Limits: 500,000 requests a day, 15 a second, burst of 10.
- No API terms page found; confirm reuse terms with DVSA before storing results.
- Checked
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
Bulk CSVs plus a keyless API (roadtraffic.dft.gov.uk/api-docs). We use the 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.
- Checked
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.
- Checked
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
- Reuse agreed with the Fuel Finder team (September 2026)
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 run by VE3 Global Ltd and enforced by the CMA. We use forecourt details and current prices for every grade (E10, E5, B7, premium diesel, B10 and HVO).
- The developer guidelines ask for attribution, prices cached for no more than 15 minutes in live services and no more than 100 requests a minute. Our pages are rebuilt twice a day and say when prices were checked.
- Checked
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.
- Checked
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 from their postcode (August 2026 edition). Great Britain only.
- Northern Ireland (BT) postcodes need a separate commercial licence from Land and Property Services, so we do not use them.
- Checked
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.
- Checked
EV charging stations (amenity=charging_station), United Kingdom
OpenStreetMap contributors
- Access
- API
- Updated
- Daily (fetched through the Overpass API)
- 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 at /ev/chargers/.
- 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.
- Checked
Charging locations, United Kingdom (open-licensed records)
Open Charge Map contributors
- Access
- API
- Updated
- Daily (Open Charge Map API)
- Publisher’s page
- openchargemap.org
Public, operational sites only. Used with OpenStreetMap for the charger finder at /ev/chargers/; the two are combined only in the browser.
- 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.
- Fair use: two API calls a day, with an identifying user agent.
- Checked
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) and DRT121F (top 10 faults), Great Britain, 2007/08 to 2025/26. Updated 25 June 2026.
- Checked
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).
- Checked
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. VINs are not published. Downloaded by hand in September 2026; latest launch date in the file 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.
- Checked
Transport Data Feeds (DATEX II)
National Highways
- Access
- API
- Updated
- Near real time
- Publisher’s page
- developer.data.nationalhighways.co.uk
Road and Lane Closures v2.0: GET https://api.data.nationalhighways.co.uk/roads/v2.0/closures with the subscription key in an Ocp-Apim-Subscription-Key header, X-Response-MediaType: application/json for JSON, and paging through the x-next header. Closures that have finished stay marked active for seven days, so we check the end time ourselves. We publish planned closures, not unplanned incident closures: a site rebuilt a few times a day cannot report an incident honestly.
- England’s strategic road network only: the motorways and trunk A-roads National Highways manages, not council roads.
- Supplied free, but National Highways may start charging with 6 to 12 months’ notice.
- Their logos and branding may not be used, and the attribution statement is required wherever the data appears.
- Automated extraction other than through these licensed feeds (scraping their websites) is not allowed.
- Provided "as is", with no warranty of accuracy: closures can change after we read them.
- Awaiting confirmation
Street Manager open data (roadworks)
Department for Transport
- Access
- Push feed
- Updated
- Near real time (push notifications)
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
- Publisher’s page
- www.gov.uk/guidance/find-and-use-roadworks-data
- Pushes notifications to an endpoint we host, rather than a queryable API.
- England only.
- Sign-up terms of use still to be read.
- Checked
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.
- Checked
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’s pages state Crown copyright but no separate reuse licence; we are confirming the terms with VCA (fuel@vca.gov.uk).
- 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.
- Checked
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.