Passenger cars and vans currently registered in New Zealand
By country of origin, as at 31 January 2025, number of vehicles
| Country of origin | Number of vehicles |
|---|---|
| Argentina | 18 |
| Australia | 162,157 |
| Austria | 4,514 |
| Belgium | 17,095 |
| Brazil | 23 |
| Canada | 3,720 |
| China | 63,699 |
| Czechia | 28,143 |
| Denmark | 3 |
| France | 25,818 |
| Germany | 322,680 |
| Greece | 8 |
| Hong Kong | 31 |
| Hungary | 19,718 |
| India | 15,239 |
| Indonesia | 42 |
| Ireland | 3 |
| Italy | 12,411 |
| Japan | 2,248,968 |
| Malaysia | 82 |
| Mexico | 8,677 |
| Netherlands | 2,749 |
| New Zealand | 6,871 |
| Norway | 5 |
| Not stated | 76,823 |
| Other | 6,209 |
| Philippines | 9 |
| Poland | 4,134 |
| Portugal | 2,364 |
| Romania | 3,151 |
| Russia | 2 |
| Singapore | 236 |
| Slovakia | 6,668 |
| South Africa | 9,134 |
| South Korea | 258,535 |
| Spain | 27,287 |
| Sweden | 11,871 |
| Switzerland | 19 |
| Taiwan | 915 |
| Thailand | 96,856 |
| Türkiye | 2,463 |
| UK | 99,617 |
| USA | 99,274 |
| USSR | 308 |
| Vietnam | 1 |
| Yugoslavia/Serbia and Montenegro | 27 |
Definitions
Vehicle type: Please refer to this webpage for details https://www.nzta.govt.nz/vehicles/vehicle-types/
- ATVs: All-terrain vehicles (vehicles that are principally designed for off-road use, such as quad bikes, smaller ‘side by sides’ and amphibious vehicles)
- Trailers/caravans: Includes boat trailers, horse floats, caravans, flat-deck trailers and other commercial trailers of less than 3.5 tonnes.
Vehicle usage: Classification of how a vehicle is primarily used. This field groups several more detailed usage types
Motive power: Identifies the primary fuel source that powers the vehicle
Import status: The status of a vehicle as it arrives into New Zealand
- New: A vehicle never previously registered or used in any country, that is not built from scratch.
- Scratch: The vehicle was built by an individual from raw materials and registered via LVV certification. Trailers and kit-cars fall under this category.
- Re-Registered: Car was previously registered in the MVR, de-registered from vehicle licencing, and has now been re-entered back into the system.
- Used: Vehicle has been imported into the country from overseas. Excludes those brought in from and overseas factory to be sold as new vehicles via dealership.
Basic colour: The predominant colour of the vehicle
Vehicle year: Year of manufacture or model year. If unknown or the vehicle has been re-registered, this is the year of first registration.
Registration: The process of adding a vehicle to the Motor Vehicle Register: a vehicle, whether new or used, must first be registered before it can be licensed to be used on the road. Registration has been traditionally confused with licensing: registration is normally carried out only once in the lifetime of a vehicle, whereas licensing is generally renewed every six or twelve months.
For more information
Limitations of the data
Many fields on the Motor Vehicle Register (MVR) are free text fields and may therefore be subject to spelling mistakes and other human error. The NZTA have algorithmically cleaned the data to correct identified errors, it should be noted that due to the large number of vehicles on the register, some information may not have been corrected in this data.
Inclusions
The data represents the total registered fleet. Inside the registered fleet, there are vehicles that are currently licensed, and those that are not.
Exclusions
The data excludes any vehicles that have been deregistered from the MVR and the ones that were never registered in the first place.
Data provided by
Dataset name
Motor Vehicle Register: Vehicle data - all vehicle years January 2025
Webpage:
How to find the data
At URL provided, download 'Vehicle data – all vehicle years'.
This file has over 5 million rows. For processing purposes, Figure.NZ created a set of aggregated statistics by selecting the following variables: VEHICLE TYPE by VEHICLE_USAGE, MOTIVE_POWER, IMPORT_STATUS, BASIC_COLOUR, VEHICLE_YEAR, ORIGINAL_COUNTRY, and TLA.
Import & extraction details
File as imported: Motor Vehicle Register: Vehicle data - all vehicle years January 2025
From the dataset Motor Vehicle Register: Vehicle data - all vehicle years January 2025, this data was extracted:
- Sheet: VehicleType Crosstab
- Range:
C148:Q195 - Provided: 705 data points
This data forms the table Transport - Registered vehicles by country of origin Jan 2025.
Dataset originally released on:
February 2025
About this dataset
This dataset provides information about currently registered vehicles as recorded on the Motor Vehicle Register (MVR) at the end of each month. It’s the best representation of what vehicles can be legally operated on the road as of reporting date.
The Motor Vehicle Register records information about vehicles used on New Zealand roads and the persons responsible for their use. Information held on the Motor Vehicle Register consists of:
-personal information about persons registered (past and present) in respect of motor vehicles, and
-vehicle information concerning registered motor vehicles.
Personal information includes the names, addresses and dates of birth of persons registered (or previously registered) in respect of motor vehicles.
Vehicle information includes details such as make, model, colour, weight, usage category (for example private passenger, goods, taxi, ambulance, rental, hearse) cc rating, fuel type, wheelbase, odometer reading, country of origin, whether imported second hand or new, vehicle inspection history, whether subject to warrant of fitness or certificate of fitness inspections, tare weight, axle rating and number of axles in the case of trucks and the number of registered persons.
Purpose of collection
The primary purposes of the Motor Vehicle Register are:
-enforcement of the law
-maintenance of the security of New Zealand
-collection of charges imposed or authorised by an act
-administration and development of transport law and policy.