How to check vehicle registration online in Pakistan, region by region

9 min read · Facts checked 2026-10-08

There is no single national check: each region keeps its own register. Islamabad's official lookup needs the registration number and date. Punjab's MTMIS needs the number, the registration date and a picture captcha. Sindh's takes the number alone, behind a Google reCAPTCHA. We could not confirm a working lookup for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and the official vehicle pages for Azad Jammu & Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan have no lookup on them. VehicleCheckPK checks Islamabad registrations only, from the plate alone.

The first job is working out which register holds the vehicle. A vehicle registered in one register will not appear in another. Search the wrong one and you may get nothing, or a record for a different vehicle with the same mark.

The letters on a Pakistani number plate do not tell you which province issued it. The number plate letters page explains why, and what to do instead.

The official lookups in Islamabad, Punjab and Sindh are free. This guide does not cover Balochistan. We have not verified an online registration lookup there, and we will not describe one we have not checked.

Islamabad's official vehicle lookup asks for two things: the registration number and the registration date. There is no captcha. Get the date wrong and the portal returns nothing at all. It looks exactly the same as a vehicle that does not exist.

On the official portal

1. Go to the Islamabad Excise & Taxation website and open its vehicle lookup.
2. Enter the registration number.
3. Enter the registration date.
4. If the result is empty, check the date before you conclude anything about the vehicle.

On VehicleCheckPK

You need only the registration number. The official portal wants the date as well; we work it out for you. ABC-1234, abc 1234 and ABC1234 are all read as the same number.

The Islamabad page explains the record field by field, along with token tax, transfers and fines.

Punjab's MTMIS lookup needs three things: the vehicle number, the registration date and a picture captcha. The plate on its own will not open it.

The form keeps changing, which is why so many guides describe one that no longer exists. Until at least 8 November 2023 it had one field, the vehicle number. On 26 August 2026 it also asked for the chassis number. When we checked on 4 October 2026, the chassis field had been replaced by the registration date.

1. Go to mtmis.excise.punjab.gov.pk.
2. Enter the vehicle number.
3. Pick the registration date. It is printed on your registration book or smart card.
4. Type the picture captcha and press Search.

MTMIS cannot tell you the registration date: it asks for it before it shows anything. The date is on your registration book or smart card, and it is the same date the 9771 fuel relief SMS asks for.

The Punjab page has more on the registration date and the form. We do not check Punjab records.

Sindh's lookup asks only for the registration number, but it sits behind a Google reCAPTCHA. We cannot answer it for you.

1. Go to the Excise Sindh's Online Vehicle Verification.
2. Sindh searches motorcycles separately from four-wheelers, so make sure you are searching the right kind of vehicle.
3. Enter the registration number, complete the reCAPTCHA and search.

Sindh notified a new registration series on 13 February 2026: four letters and three digits for four-wheelers, three letters and four digits for motorcycles and three-wheelers. The Sindh page has more on its register.

We could not confirm that Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has a working online lookup. Its old records form now redirects to the department's homepage, and the homepage's own Vehicle Verification link leads nowhere (checked 29 September 2026).

That old form would not run without a district, and its own examples of a registration number were B 9838 and 2012110046. There is no single plate format that covers Pakistan. The form's district list predates the 2017 district splits and the 2018 merger of the tribal districts, so a newer district may not appear on it. The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa page sets out what we could and could not confirm.

Azad Jammu & Kashmir's vehicle verification page is an under-construction placeholder. There is no lookup on it. Gilgit-Baltistan's page titled 'Vehicle Search' has no vehicle search on it. Its only field is the website's own search box.

An empty result is not proof that a vehicle does not exist. Rule these out first.

You searched the wrong register

A vehicle registered in one register will not appear in another. Punjab, Sindh and Islamabad have each worked through the same three-letter space, each starting at AAA, so the same old-format plate can be a valid mark in more than one register at the same time. The wrong register can return nothing, or a real record for a different vehicle. Vehicles also move between registers: Punjab announced re-registration of vehicles registered outside Punjab in January 2026.

The Islamabad date is wrong

On the official Islamabad lookup, a wrong registration date is the first thing to rule out.

The Punjab number is not in the format the form expects

Punjab's own form suggests trying different formats: lxz 123, lxz 0123, lxz 1111, lxz-07-1111. Try a leading zero, and try it with and without a space. The form also asks for the registration date, so check that against the registration book.

You were not on the official site

Several unofficial sites put MTMIS in their own web address. The official lookups sit on islamabadexcise.gov.pk, mtmis.excise.punjab.gov.pk and excise.gos.pk. Check the address bar before you type anything.

You used our box for a plate registered elsewhere

We search the Islamabad register only. If your vehicle is registered anywhere else, an empty result here means we did not look in the right place, not that the vehicle does not exist. A result, if one comes back, may belong to a different vehicle with the same mark.

An excise register is a tax and title record. For an Islamabad vehicle it covers the make, model, year, colour, body type, engine and chassis numbers, engine size, registration and purchase dates, assessed value and token tax status, where the register holds them.

Before a purchase, the identifiers are the most useful part. Compare the chassis and engine numbers in the record with the numbers stamped on the vehicle and printed in the registration book, character by character. If they do not match, stop there.

HPA

HPA on an Islamabad record means Hire Purchase Agreement: the vehicle is under bank finance. The bank has to endorse the transfer form before ownership can move. The release is called HPT, and it costs nothing. What HPA means for a sale.

Tax paid upto

An old date is not proof the tax is unpaid. The department says token tax paid at a post office may not reach its computer record, and that you have to go in to have the record updated. See Islamabad token tax in 2026.

Any other status

We print status values exactly as the register returns them. Beyond HPA and HPT there is no departmental legend for them, so we do not invent one.

Not in a way you can rely on. An excise register is a tax and title record, and theft sits with the police, in systems only officers can query. Our lookup cannot answer that question. Excise Sindh's lookup shows a CPLC status tile next to tax and HPA (on a lookup run on 8 October 2026 it read 'Vehicle is Clear'), and a clear status still does not prove that the vehicle in front of you is the one on the record.

A clean record does not prove the vehicle or its papers are genuine either. Khyber Pakhtunkhwa's excise department said it on its own lookup page, before that page went offline: the record 'does not reflect the genuineness of the vehicle or its documents/informations'.

The register can be wrong at the source: between 2015 and 2018 more than 7,000 vehicles were registered in Punjab on forged documents. And the plate may not belong to the vehicle. Police cameras in Karachi found about 1,600 vehicles running on fake number plates, and a cloned plate returns a real, clean record belonging to a different car.

A real theft check is run against police records, in person or by phone. In Punjab, a Police Khidmat Markaz does it for Rs 500 for a motorcycle and Rs 2,000 for anything else; ring first, because not every centre lists the service. In Karachi, CPLC publishes a 24-hour line, which we have not tested. How to check whether a vehicle is stolen has the details, and checks before buying a used car puts them in order.

VehicleCheckPK is independent and not affiliated with any government department. The excise departments and police forces named here hold the authoritative records; for any legal purpose, confirm with them directly.