Personalized number plates too expensive Car fans disappointed - RÖSTI007 number falls by the wayside

The hope of personalized number plates in Switzerland is over for the time being. The Federal Roads Office (Astra) has decided to stop the planned introduction of personalized license plates.

The Federal Roads Office (Astra) has dashed the hopes of many motorists for personalized license plates, so-called vanity plates, as the newspaper "Blick" writes.

Despite a review of such plans announced in August, which were intended to allow an individual combination of letters and numbers, such as "RÖSTI007", there will be no such license plates in Switzerland.

The entire redesign of license plates, which was planned as part of the project, has been put on hold, as confirmed by Astra at the request of "Blick".

Zurich and Bern are running out of numbers

There are various reasons for this decision. On the one hand, the cantons of Zurich and Bern are facing the problem that they will soon run out of available license plates. In Zurich, this is expected to be the case in 2027, which is why they are already switching to seven-digit license plates.

This regulation is due to come into force at the end of 2025 and will also affect Bern as soon as the six-digit numbers have been used up. The federal government also cites savings programs as a further reason for suspending the redesign. The financial and time expenditure would not be sustainable in the current situation, explained Astra.

Ticino residents do not agree with the federal government's decision

The federal government's decision has been met with particular criticism in Ticino. A spokesperson for the canton said that they did not agree with the Astra's unilateral approach and would have expected a discussion with the cantons. The personalized license plates could have generated additional income, especially in difficult economic times. The sale of license plates regularly generates large sums of money, as a recent example from Zurich shows: There, the license plate "ZH 24" was auctioned off for 299,000 francs.

Bern's Director of Security Philippe Müller also shows understanding for the Astra's decision. He himself owns a license plate with his date of birth, but sees no reason to doubt the switch to seven-digit numbers. "These could also meet with interest, such as a seven-digit 1," he commented.

In addition to the vanity plates, the demand to integrate the country code "CH" into the license plate will not be implemented. This idea was launched in 2019 as part of a popular initiative and examined by the Federal Council, but is also part of the halted project to redesign the number plates.