Decode Your VIN
Enter your vehicle's VIN code to discover all technical specifications. The VIN consists of 17 alphanumeric characters.
The first character of a VIN tells you which region of the world the car came from.
The first three characters together, called the World Manufacturer Identifier, or WMI, tell you exactly who built it and where.
That’s worth understanding before you decode anything else, because the WMI is the only part of a VIN that’s assigned by an outside authority. The rest is up to the manufacturer.
The WMI is registered with the Society of Automotive Engineers and cross-referenced with NHTSA’s vPIC database.
If you want to understand what the other 14 characters mean, read the full breakdown in how to read a VIN number.
How the WMI works
Position 1 is a region code. Position 2 narrows it to a country. Position 3 identifies the specific manufacturer within that country.
A few examples:
1 = United States
2 = Canada
3 = Mexico
J = Japan
K = South Korea
L = China
S = United Kingdom
V = France
W = Germany
Z = Italy
9 = Brazil / Argentina
That’s the region layer. The country gets more specific from there.
North America
1AA–1FZ: General Motors (US)
1FA–1FZ: Ford Motor Company (US)
1C3–1C9: Chrysler (US)
1HG: Honda (US-assembled)
1N4: Nissan (US-assembled)
1VW: Volkswagen (US-assembled, Chattanooga)
2HG: Honda (Canada)
2T1: Toyota (Canada)
3VW: Volkswagen (Mexico)
3FA: Ford (Mexico)
One thing that confuses people: a car branded as Japanese isn’t necessarily a Japanese VIN.
A Honda Accord built in Marysville, Ohio starts with 1HG, not a J. The WMI reflects where the vehicle was assembled, not where the brand is headquartered. If that distinction matters to you, and for some buyers it does, the assembly plant is also encoded in position 11 of the VIN.
Europe
WAU, WBA, WBS, WBY: BMW and Audi variants (Germany)
WDB, WDC, WDD: Mercedes-Benz (Germany)
WP0, WP1: Porsche (Germany)
VF1, VF3: Renault (France)
VNE, VNK: Toyota (France, Turkey)
SAL, SAJ: Land Rover, Jaguar (UK)
SCA, SCB: Rolls-Royce, Bentley (UK)
ZAR: Alfa Romeo (Italy)
ZFF: Ferrari (Italy)
ZLA: Lancia (Italy)
European WMI codes are less consistent than North American ones because several manufacturers have moved production around over the decades. A MINI assembled in Oxford starts with SAR; the same model built in the Netherlands starts with VF3. That’s not a mistake in the VIN, it just reflects where the car was actually built.
Japan and South Korea
JHM: Honda (Japan)
JT2, JT3, JTD: Toyota (Japan)
JN1, JN6: Nissan (Japan)
JM1: Mazda (Japan)
JS1, JS2, JS3: Suzuki, Subaru (Japan, depending on digit 2)
KL4, KL7: Daewoo, Chevrolet Korea (South Korea)
KMH, KMF: Hyundai (South Korea)
KNA, KND: Kia (South Korea)
Small-volume manufacturers
If the third character of a WMI is 9, the manufacturer produces fewer than 500 vehicles per year. For these low-volume builders, positions 12 through 14 of the VIN serve as the second half of the WMI, which gives them a unique identifier despite the compressed namespace.
This applies to kit car builders, specialty manufacturers, and some rare exotics. If you’re looking at a VIN starting with something like SCC (McLaren) or ZHW (Lamborghini models made in small batches), the volume rules may apply.
When the WMI doesn’t match what you expect
A few situations where the WMI surprises people:
Rebadged vehicles. A Chevrolet Colorado and a GMC Canyon share a platform but will have different WMIs if built in different plants or in different years.
Captive imports. Some vehicles sold under an American brand were assembled overseas. The WMI will reflect the actual build location, not the badge.
Re-exported vehicles. A Japanese domestic market car brought to the US will have a J-region WMI and may not decode fully in NHTSA’s database, since Japanese manufacturers don’t always register JDM-spec VINs with American authorities.
If you’re checking a vehicle’s history and the WMI doesn’t match the badge, that’s worth investigating. It’s usually just a globalized supply chain, but sometimes it flags a grey-market import or a title that doesn’t match the physical car. For anything involving title history, a full vehicle history report will catch what a decoder can’t.
South America in more depth
The region digit for South America is split by country rather than shared. 8 is assigned to Argentina and 9 to Brazil, which between them account for the large majority of vehicles assembled on the continent. A Volkswagen or Ford built at a Brazilian plant will carry a 9-series WMI even though the same model built in Argentina carries an 8-series one, so the region digit alone tells you the assembly country, not the brand’s country of origin.
Brazil and Argentina both host assembly plants for several global manufacturers, including GM, Ford, Volkswagen, Fiat, and Toyota, so seeing a South American WMI on a brand you associate with Europe, Japan, or the US is normal and simply reflects regional manufacturing rather than a rebadge or a grey-market import.
Oceania and other regions
6 is the region digit assigned to Australia and 7 to New Zealand. Vehicles historically assembled in Australia, including locally built Fords and Holdens before Australian manufacturing wound down in the 2010s, carry a 6-series WMI.
The letters A through H are reserved for Africa, and M, N, P, and R cover additional Asian markets beyond Japan, South Korea, and China, including India, Turkey, the Philippines, and Taiwan. VinDecoderPlus does not maintain a complete brand-by-brand list for every regional manufacturer in these areas, since coverage and registration practices vary by country. If a VIN from one of these regions does not decode fully, that is a limitation of available manufacturer data rather than an indication the VIN is invalid.
Putting it together with a real VIN
A VIN starting with KNA tells you two things before you decode anything else: the vehicle is South Korean-market or South Korean-assembled (region K), and it was built by Kia specifically (the full three-character WMI). From there, the remaining 14 characters, decoded through NHTSA’s registered manufacturer data, fill in the model, model year, and plant. Our Kia Sportage VIN decoder walks through exactly that process for one specific model.
The same logic applies everywhere: the WMI narrows the search to one manufacturer and one plant, and the rest of the VIN, explained position by position in how to read a VIN number, does the rest. If you want to confirm that the 17 characters are internally consistent before trusting the decode, see how the VIN check digit works.
FAQs
What does the first character of a VIN mean?
It identifies the geographic region where the vehicle was built. “1” is the United States, “J” is Japan, “W” is Germany, and so on.
Can two cars have the same WMI?
No. Each WMI is unique to one manufacturer at one production location. A Toyota built in Kentucky and a Toyota built in Japan will have different WMIs.
What if I can’t find my WMI code in any list?
Decode the full VIN at VinDecoderPlus. The database pulls directly from NHTSA’s registered manufacturer records, so it’ll identify codes that aren’t in any static list.
Why does a Japanese-brand car sometimes have a US or Canadian WMI?
Because the WMI reflects where the specific vehicle was assembled, not where the brand is headquartered. Toyota, Honda, and Nissan all operate large assembly plants in North America, and vehicles built there carry a 1, 2, or 3-series WMI regardless of the badge on the car.
Does the WMI change if a car is exported to another country?
No. The WMI is fixed at the point of assembly and never changes, even if the vehicle is later sold, registered, or re-exported to a different country. A German-built BMW keeps its German WMI regardless of where it ends up being driven.
