Greek vehicle registration plates are composed of three letters and four digits per plate (e.g. AAA-1000). The letters represent the district (prefecture) that issues the plates while the numbers begin from 1000 to 9999. Similar plates with digits beginning from 1 to 999 are issued for motorcycles which exceed 50 cc.
With the exception of Athens and Thessaloniki, all districts are represented by the first 2 letters. The final letter in the sequence changes in Greek alphabetical order after 9,000 issued plates. For example, Patras plates are AXA-1000, where AX represents the Achaia prefecture of which Patras is the capital. When AXA-9999 is reached the plates turn to AXB-1000 and this continues until AXX is finished. Only the letters from the intersection between the Latin and Greek alphabets by glyph appearance are used, namely A, B, E, Z, H, I, K, M, N, O, P, T, Y, X (in Greek alphabetical order). This is because Greece is a contracting party to the Vienna Convention on Road Traffic, which in Article 35 requires registration numbers to be displayed in capital Latin characters and Arabic numerals. Similar system is used in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Bulgaria.
Combinations used for overseas residents are L-DDDD (where L = letter and D = digit) and are limited. Until 2003, taxis used L-DDDD; the plate was aligned with the prefecture and the letters were colored red.
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When number plates were introduced to Greece, they were numbered and in the late 1950s the system was D-DDD and DD-DDD. In the 1960s, the system was DDD-DDD. They became lettered in 1972 and the system was LL-DDDD while trucks used L-DDDD until 1983, when they changed to LLL-DDDD and now use the present system.
The first 2 of 3 letters (which are listed below) of a licence plate usually represent the prefecture (nomos) where the car was registered. The almost full list of plates in Greece is below (next to the prefecture / district is its capital or an area within the prefecture that the plates are issued; some prefectures have more than one combination):
KOH and KOK --> Thessaloniki prefecture, KOP --> Heraklio prefecture {motorcycles})Vehicles that belong to public services and armed forces use special license plates with the following letter combinations followed by numbers:
ΔΣ 48 CD, ΔΣ 48-1 CD) (green coloured)The following categories are conflicting: The same letter combinations are used for both public services and specific regions: