Volkswagen Transporter belongs to the marque's van population rather than its conventional passenger cars. This registration belongs to Volkswagen's commercial van range, widely used for deliveries, trades, minibuses and conversions and therefore subject to a different working life from passenger cars. A Transporter can remain useful well beyond its first operator, so body condition, continued purpose and specialist support increasingly determine whether it stays in service.
GROWING
Red List classification, from population, five year trajectory and survival against peak. Reviewed each census.
351,397licensed vehicles 2025 census
100.0% of the peak fleet remains licensed
32,933
declared SORN
total surviving
peak 351,397 in 2025 ·
+10,122 vehicles a year, five year trend
Population history
Licensed and SORN vehicles at each census. The filters below apply to the family population, MOT and registration figures. They do not alter the generation history above.
LicensedSORNLatest census observationSOURCE DVLA VEH0120 / VEH0220
Inside the surviving fleet
AutoCensus parses every DVLA variant description, so the fleet can be read by fuel and specification rather than as one number.
Fuel · share of licensed fleet
First registrations by year
When surviving examples first joined the British fleet.
New registrations
Vehicles first registered each year. A fleet still being sold shows here; a finished one shows only imports.
MOT reliability
DVSA test results for this family, 2005 to 2025.
Pass rate by year
Failure reason
Failures
Share of all tests
A rear registration plate lamp or light source missing or inoperative in the case of multiple lamps or light sources
167,396
3.7%
Windscreen or window damaged or seriously discoloured but not adversely affecting driver's view
124,370
2.8%
A rear registration plate lamp with any lamp not working
82,345
1.8%
A suspension joint dust cover severely deteriorated
79,409
1.8%
A transmission shaft constant velocity joint boot severely deteriorated
75,008
1.7%
A wiper blade insecure, missing or in such a condition that it does not clear the windscreen effectively to give the driver an adequate view of the road (through the windscreen) to the left and right sides of the vehicle, as well as to the front
62,747
1.4%
A spring or spring component fractured or seriously weakened
59,556
1.3%
Tyre tread depth not in accordance with the requirements
52,200
1.2%
Counted across every recorded test, 2005 to 2025. Advisories are excluded.
Where the Transporter remains
Based on MOT test locations, 2025. Test location is a proxy: a vehicle is counted where it was last tested, not where it is kept.
Population history combines DVLA VEH0120 Q4 census observations through 2013 with the annual VEH0220 census from 2014 onward. Figures before 2014 cover Great Britain only. Historical VEH0120 is used only when its overlapping UK observations reconcile to the current canonical family definition. Vehicles are grouped into this family using the DVLA GenModel together with durable routing rules for known inconsistencies.
Variant figures are parsed from raw DVLA model descriptions and the original string is always retained. Configuration is only assigned where the model description explicitly identifies it; a blank configuration is not treated as a two door Wrangler. Blank transmission fields are shown as manual because DVLA records the field for automatic vehicles.
MOT figures count tests, not vehicles, and geographic figures count each vehicle at its most recent test location. The decline projection is a straight line fitted to the latest five years and is illustrative only.