Editing Vanity plate (section)

==North America==
{{See also|Vehicle registration plates of the United States#Vanity and specialty plates}}
[[File:2012 Texas license plate CHWBCA vanity.jpg|thumb|A vanity plate in [[Amarillo, Texas]], referencing the ''[[Star Wars]]'' character [[Chewbacca]].]]
Vanity plates are issued by every U.S. state and the [[Vehicle registration plates of Washington, D.C.|District of Columbia]], and every Canadian province except [[Vehicle registration plates of Newfoundland and Labrador|Newfoundland and Labrador]].<ref name=Quebec>{{cite news |title = Vanity license plates coming to Quebec |url = http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/vanity-licence-plates-coming-to-quebec-1.2517931 |access-date = February 3, 2014 |newspaper = CBC News |date = February 3, 2014 }}</ref>

In 2007, the [[American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators]] (AAMVA) and Stefan Lonce, author of ''License to Roam: Vanity License Plates and the Stories They Tell'', conducted North America's first state by state and province by province survey of vanity plates, revealing that there are 9.7 million vehicles with personalized vanity license plates. The survey ranked jurisdictions by "vanity plate penetration rate", which is the percentage of registered motor vehicles that are vanitized. [[Vehicle registration plates of Virginia|Virginia]] has the highest U.S. vanity plate penetration rate (16.19%), followed by [[Vehicle registration plates of New Hampshire|New Hampshire]] (13.99%), [[Vehicle registration plates of Illinois|Illinois]] (13.41%), [[Vehicle registration plates of Nevada|Nevada]] (12.73%), [[Vehicle registration plates of Montana|Montana]] (9.8%), [[Vehicle registration plates of Maine|Maine]] (9.7%), [[Vehicle registration plates of Connecticut|Connecticut]] (8.14%), [[Vehicle registration plates of New Jersey|New Jersey]] (6.8%), [[Vehicle registration plates of North Dakota|North Dakota]] (6.5%) and [[Vehicle registration plates of Vermont|Vermont]] (6.1%). [[Vehicle registration plates of Texas|Texas]] had the lowest vanity plate penetration rate (0.5%).<ref>{{cite web |url = http://www.aamva.org/About/PressRoom/PressReleases/WHZ+SO+VN.htm |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20120207193807/http://www.aamva.org/About/PressRoom/PressReleases/WHZ+SO+VN.htm |title = AAMVA : Who's So Vain? |archive-date = February 7, 2012 }}</ref> Virginia's high rate of vanity plates, in particular, was attributed to the low cost per annum compared to a standard plate: the state charges $10 more for vanity plates than for state-issued plates, compared to $50 more in [[Vehicle registration plates of Maryland|Maryland]] and [[Vehicle registration plates of Texas|Texas]], and $100 more in [[Vehicle registration plates of Washington, D.C.|Washington, D.C.]]<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://wtop.com/local/2017/10/vanity-plates-dc-maryland-virginia/|title=CENSORD: Funniest, foulest, most outrageous vanity plates in the DC area|date=2017-10-12|website=WTOP|language=en|access-date=2020-02-25}}</ref> According to the [[Federal Highway Administration]], in 2005 there were 242,991,747 privately owned and commercial registered automobiles, trucks, and motorcycles in the U.S., and 3.83% of eligible U.S. vehicles have vanity plates.

[[Vehicle registration plates of Ontario|Ontario]] had the highest Canadian vanity plate penetration rate (4.59%), followed by [[Vehicle registration plates of Saskatchewan|Saskatchewan]] (2.69%), [[Vehicle registration plates of Manitoba|Manitoba]] (1.96%), the [[Vehicle registration plates of the Yukon|Yukon]] (1.79%), and the [[Vehicle registration plates of the Northwest Territories|Northwest Territories]] (1.75%). [[Vehicle registration plates of British Columbia|British Columbia]] had the lowest vanity plate penetration rate (0.59%) among those provinces that issue vanity plates. According to [[Statistics Canada]], in 2006 there were 14,980,046 registered motor vehicles (excluding [[bus]]es, [[Trailer (vehicle)|trailers]], and off-road, farm and construction vehicles) in the provinces and territories that issue vanity plates, and 2.94% of eligible Canadian vehicles have vanity plates.

[[File:Massachusetts vanity motorcycle license plate Poops.jpg|thumb|left|Massachusetts vanity plate on a [[motorcycle]] in [[Boston]].]]
In some states and provinces, optional plates can also be vanity plates and are a choice of motorists who want a more distinctive personalised plate. However, the maximum number of characters on an optional plate may be lower than on a standard-issue plate. For example, the U.S. state of Virginia allows up to 7.5 characters (a space or hyphen is counted as 0.5 character) on a standard-issue plate, but only up to 6 characters on many of its optional plates. In some states, a motorist may also check the availability of a desired combination online. In New Jersey, which uses six alphanumeric characters on its plates, drivers can order vanity plates with seven characters.

All U.S. states and Canadian provinces that issue vanity plates have a "blue list" of vanity plates that contains banned words, phrases, or letter/number combinations. The U.S. state of [[Florida]], for example, has banned such plates as [[Chevrolet Impala|"PIMPALA"]], while the state of [[New York (state)|New York]] bans any plates with the letters "[[New York City Fire Department|FDNY]]", "[[New York City Police Department|NYPD]]", or "[[God|GOD]]", among others.<ref name="smoking gun">{{cite web |url = http://www.thesmokinggun.com/blueplate/blueplate.html |title = Blue license plate special |access-date = October 7, 2006 |publisher = [[The Smoking Gun]] }}</ref> Often the ban is to eliminate confusion with plates used on governmental vehicles or plates used on other classes of vehicles. However, a licensing authority's discretion to deny or revoke "offensive" vanity plates is finite, as some U.S. motorists have successfully sued their state governments on that issue under the [[First Amendment to the United States Constitution]].<ref>{{cite web |url = http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/Speech/arts/topic.aspx?topic=license_plates |title = License Plates |work = First Amendment Center |archive-url = http://webarchive.loc.gov/all/20041222031250/http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/speech/arts/topic.aspx?topic=license_plates |archive-date = December 22, 2004 }}</ref> The "blue list" is not definitive; in general, the agent processing an application for a vanity plate can reject a plate if it is deemed offensive, even if the phrase does not match a banned word exactly. State DMVs have received complaints about offensive vanity plates.<ref>{{cite web |url = http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/wiscplates1.html |title = Documents |date = June 12, 2014 }}</ref> In this case, the DMV can revoke a plate if it is deemed offensive, even if it had been previously approved.<ref>{{cite web |url = http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/0721041plate1.html |title = End Of Road For GOTMILF License Plate |work = The Smoking Gun |date = June 12, 2014 }}</ref> The "blue list" may be limited to genuine vanity plates, not covering computer-generated accidents. For example, Florida's famous "A55 RGY" license plate (with the standard drawing of an orange in the middle) looks like "ASS ORGY".<ref>{{cite web |url = http://www.snopes.com/photos/risque/license.asp |title = Licensed to Thrill |author = snopes |date = February 9, 2016 |work = snopes }}</ref> The state of Georgia banned the word "[[covfefe]]", a misspelling of the word "coverage" that was coined by U.S. President [[Donald Trump]] on his Twitter to its customized plates.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.ajc.com/news/local/covfefe-list-vanity-license-plates-banned-georgia/2EkWhfjlfVKHpTB5ysP6aL/|title='Covfefe' on list of vanity license plates banned in Georgia|first=Stephanie|last=Lamm|newspaper=The Atlanta Journal-Constitution|access-date=September 9, 2019}}</ref>