Vehicle registration plates of Nebraska

The U.S. state of Nebraska first required its residents to register their motor vehicles and display license plates in 1915. All plates were made of steel until 1947 when aluminum plates were introduced.

Passenger plates 1923 to present

In 1956, the U.S. states and Canadian provinces came to an agreement with the Automobile Manufacturers Association that fixed the size for license plates for vehicles, except those for motorcycles, at six inches in height by twelve inches in width, with standardized mounting holes. The 1955 (dated 1956) issue was the first Nebraska license plate that complied with these standards.

Image	Dates issued	Design	Slogan	Serial format	Serials issued	Notes
	1923	Olive green on black	none	1-12345 10-1234	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1928	White on dark blue	none	1-12345 10-1234	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1933	Blue lettering and border embossed on yellow base.	none	1-12345 10-1234	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Issued in pairs, for front and rear of vehicle.
	1934	White on dark green	none	1-12345 10-1234	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1938	Silver on black	none	1-12345 10-1234	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1946–47	Bright white embossed lettering on red base	none	1-12345 10-12345	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Revalidated for 1947 with brown tabs.
	1948	Dark blue on unpainted aluminum	none	1-12345 10-12345	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1949	Crimson on unpainted aluminum	none	1-12345 10-12345	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1950	Dark blue on white	none	1-12345 10-12345	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1951	White on black	none	A1234A AB123A	Coded by county of issuance (A or AB)
	1952–53	Black on golden yellow	none	1-12345 10-12345	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Revalidated for 1953 with black tabs.
	1954	Golden yellow on black	none	1-12345 10-12345	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1955	Black on golden yellow	none	1-12345 10-12345	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1956	White on black with border line	The Beef State	1-123456 10-12345	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	First 6" x 12" plate.
	1957	Green on white with border line	The Beef State	1-123456 10-12345	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1958–59	Black on golden yellow with border line	The Beef State	1-123456 10-12345	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Revalidated for 1959 with aluminum tabs.
	1960–61	Golden yellow on black with border line	The Beef State	1-123456 10-12345	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Revalidated for 1961 with stickers.
	1962–64	Green on white with border line; green sticker box in bottom right corner	The Beef State	1-123456 10-12345	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Revalidated for 1963 and 1964 with stickers.
	1965	Black on white with border line	The Beef State	1-123456 10-12345	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1966–68	Red on reflective white with state outline	Centennial	1-A1234 1-AB123 10-A123 10-AB12	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Commemorated Nebraska's 100 years of statehood. Revalidated for 1967 and 1968 with stickers.
	1969–71	Black on reflective white with state outline	Cornhusker State	1-A1234 1-AB123 10-A123 10-AB12	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Revalidated for 1970 and 1971 with stickers.
	1972–75	Red on reflective white with state outline	Cornhusker State	1-A1234 1-AB123 10-A123 10-AB12 5/9-A1234	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Revalidated for 1973, 1974 and 1975 with stickers. After reaching 59-ZZ99, Sarpy County introduced five-character serials with stacked county codes; these were used on each subsequent base until 2002.
	1976–84	Red on reflective white with blue	1776 BICENTENNIAL 1976	1-A1234 1-AB123 10-A123 10-AB12 2/1-A1234 5/9-A1234	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Only base on which Scotts Bluff County, as well as Sarpy County, used five-character serials with stacked county codes.
	1984–87	Blue on reflective white	none	1-A1234 1-AB123 10-A123 10-AB12 5/9-A1234	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1987–90	Red on reflective white with yellow, orange and red sunset graphic at top	none	1-A1234 1-AB123 10-A123 10-AB12 5/9-A1234	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1990–93	Black on reflective white with light blue, gold and black windmill graphic at top	none	1-A1234 1-AB123 10-A123 10-AB12 5/9-A1234	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Early Lancaster County plates were manufactured in South Dakota using that state's number dies.
	1993–96	Blue on reflective white with blue and yellow graphic at top featuring Chimney Rock and city skyline	none	1-A1234 1-AB123 10-A123 10-AB12 5/9-A1234	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1996–99	Black on reflective white with black and orange graphic at top featuring Chimney Rock and city skyline	none	1-A1234 1-AB123 10-A123 10-AB12 5/9-A1234	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	1999–2002	Red on reflective gradient blue and white with yellow Chimney Rock and light blue city skyline graphics	none	1-A1234 1-AB123 10-A123 10-AB12 5/9-A1234	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)
	2002–05	Black on reflective gradient yellow, orange and red with black prairie landscape graphic, three black silhouettes of sandhill cranes, and an orange sun	www.state.ne.us	ABC 123	NAA 001 to ?	Issued in Douglas, Lancaster and Sarpy Counties, the three most populous. Initially issued with stickers at the bottom displaying the county name; these were discontinued due to poor quality.
				1-A1234 1-AB123 10-A123 10-AB12	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Issued in all other counties.
	2005–11	Dark blue on reflective gradient blue and white with red state outline and Conestoga wagon graphic	www.nebraska.gov	ABC 123		Issued in Douglas, Lancaster and Sarpy Counties.
				1-A1234 1-AB123 10-A123 10-AB12	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Issued in all other counties.
	2011–present	Dark green on reflective gradient white and yellow with Western meadowlark and goldenrod	nebraska.gov	ABC 123		Issued in Douglas, Lancaster and Sarpy Counties.
				1-A1234 1-AB123 10-A123 10-AB12	Coded by county of issuance (1 or 10)	Issued in all other counties.

County coding

Nebraska counties by license plate prefix

Nebraska established a county-code system for its passenger plates in 1922, with one- or two-digit codes assigned to each county in order of the number of registered vehicles in the county at that time.^[1] These codes remained constant through 1950.

For 1951, letter codes were used. One-letter codes were assigned to the first counties whose names began with those letters, while all other counties were assigned two-letter codes consisting of the initial letter and the next available letter in their names (the letters I, O and Q were not used). There were three exceptions: Douglas County, the most populous in the state, was assigned single-letter X to increase capacity; Otoe County was assigned Z as O was not allowed; and Dodge County was assigned DG instead of DD as double-letter codes were also not allowed.^[2]

The numeric code system was reintroduced in 1952, with the codes the same as before. It remains in use to this day, except in Douglas, Lancaster and Sarpy Counties, which adopted an uncoded ABC 123 serial format in 2002.

References

External links

• Nebraska license plates 1969-present

State of Nebraska
Lincoln (capital)
Topics	History Governors Lt. Governors Legislature Speakers of the Legislature People Geography Congressional districts maps Tourist attractions
Society	Crime Culture Demographics Economy Education Politics
Regions	Dissected Till Plains Grand Island metropolitan area Kearney Micropolitan Statistical Area Lincoln metropolitan area Omaha metropolitan area Panhandle Pine Ridge Rainwater Basin Sandhills Siouxland Wildcat Hills
Largest cities	Alliance Beatrice Bellevue Columbus Fremont Gering Grand Island Hastings Kearney La Vista Lexington Lincoln McCook Norfolk North Platte Omaha Papillion Scottsbluff South Sioux City York
Counties	Adams Antelope Arthur Banner Blaine Boone Box Butte Boyd Brown Buffalo Burt Butler Cass Cedar Chase Cherry Cheyenne Clay Colfax Cuming Custer Dakota Dawes Dawson Deuel Dixon Dodge Douglas Dundy Fillmore Franklin Frontier Furnas Gage Garden Garfield Gosper Grant Greeley Hall Hamilton Harlan Hayes Hitchcock Holt Hooker Howard Jefferson Johnson Kearney Keith Keya Paha Kimball Knox Lancaster Lincoln Logan Loup Madison McPherson Merrick Morrill Nance Nemaha Nuckolls Otoe Pawnee Perkins Phelps Pierce Platte Polk Red Willow Richardson Rock Saline Sarpy Saunders Scotts Bluff Seward Sheridan Sherman Sioux Stanton Thayer Thomas Thurston Valley Washington Wayne Webster Wheeler York