How to fill out California REG 17

The form that gets your personalised plate off a car you are selling and onto the next one - or into storage, or back to the DMV. Ordinary California plates stay with the car; these do not, and this is the only way to move them.

Top of the blank California REG 17, Special Interest or Environmental License Plate (ELP) Application, as the agency publishes it

Step 1 · the form itself Blank REG 17 — Special Interest or Environmental License Plate (ELP) Application PDF at dmv.ca.gov · new tab View the blank REG 17

Part of our filled-in example of California REG 17, Special Interest or Environmental License Plate (ELP) Application, showing the filled-in entries

Step 2 · how to fill it in Our filled-in REG 17 guide PDF · 2 pages · 650 KB · new tab See our filled-in example

Two documents, and they are not the same thing. Take the blank REG 17 from the dmv.ca.gov copy so you get the revision that is current today, then print our REG 17 guide and keep it beside you while you fill theirs in.

Written against REG 17 (Rev 2/2025), issued under California Vehicle Code 5060 and 5106. Take the plate off before the buyer takes the car, not after. Once the vehicle is out of your hands, retrieving a plate from a stranger is a conversation nobody enjoys.

Last updated August 22, 2026.

Filled in

What a completed one looks like

This is the actual REG 17, rendered from the PDF the California Department of Motor Vehicles publishes and completed end to end: letterhead, every field, and the blocks at the foot.

Amber — you write it
Grey — not yours to fill
Numbered — explained below

The California REG 17 filled in by someone keeping a personalised plate off a car they are selling: the Reassign, Retain, Release box ticked at the top, the Yosemite Foundation programme selected in section 1, the plate configuration and the Subaru's VIN written one character per printed box in section 4, Retain Interest for Future Use ticked beneath them, and Priya Raman's name, address, signature and telephone number in sections 5 and 6. — The REG 17, routed the way the form itself routes it. Ticking Reassign, Retain, Release at the top tells you which sections to complete - 1, 4, 5 and 6 - and greys out the two that belong to people ordering a plate rather than moving one. The plate configuration and the VIN both go in one character per printed box.

Field by field

Every line, in the order you meet it

1
You fill this in
The four boxes at the top
Original, Replacement, Reassign/Retain/Release, or Exchange. Somebody taking a plate off a car they are selling ticks the third one.
Watch out: Each box prints its own routing in italics underneath it, and the third reads Complete Sections 1, 4, 5, 6. That is the whole instruction for which parts of this form apply to you.
2
You fill this in
Section 1, which plate you already hold
One tick against the programme your plate belongs to, from the 2-6 character list on the left or the 2-7 character list on the right.
Watch out: It has to match the plate on the car, not the plate you would like next. Special recognition plates are not on this form at all - the section heading sends those to the REG 17A.
3
You fill this in
Section 4, the plate and the car it comes off
The special interest licence plate number on the left, and the vehicle identification number it is being removed from on the right.
Watch out: Both are rows of printed boxes. Write across the whole row, one character to a box, rather than bunching everything into the first few and leaving the rest empty.
4
You fill this in
Retain, surrender, or release to the new owner
Three boxes on one row, and they are the three things that can happen to a plate when the car goes: keep it for a future vehicle, hand it back to the department, or let it go with the buyer.
Watch out: Keeping it is not consequence-free. The note at the top of the form warns that you may be subject to annual retention fees if you do not immediately place the plates on another vehicle.
5
You fill this in
Section 5, purchaser or holder
Tick Same as License Plate Holder where the plate is staying with the person who already owns it, and complete only the left-hand column.
Watch out: The right-hand HOLDER column exists for the case printed in its heading - a gift or a release, where the person paying for the plate and the person keeping it are two different people.
6
You fill this in
True full name
Last name, first name, middle initial and suffix, in the order the box prints them.
Watch out: This is the name a retained plate is held against between one vehicle and the next, so it wants to be the name on your licence rather than a shortened everyday version of it.
7
You fill this in
Street address, city, state and zip
Where the department writes to you about the plate.
Watch out: A retained plate is something you own that lives in a record rather than on a bumper. Let the address go stale and the notices about it go stale too.
8
You fill this in
Section 6, signature
Sign and date under the perjury declaration, with a daytime telephone number and, if you want one, an email address.
Watch out: The email box is the only one on this row the form marks optional. And read the NOTE above section 1 before you sign - no change of plate selection or configuration is honoured after the application goes in.

At a glance

What goes where

On the form	What to put in it
The four boxes at the top	Original, Replacement, Reassign/Retain/Release, or Exchange. A seller wants the third one, and the form tells you which sections it needs: 1, 4, 5 and 6.
Section 1, licence plate selection	Which programme the plate belongs to. Relevant to a seller only in that it has to match the plate you already hold.
Section 4, reassign, retain or release	The three things you can do with the plate when the car goes. Reassign puts it on another vehicle you own now. Retain holds it for a future vehicle. Release surrenders it to the DMV.
Section 5	Vehicle and owner details for whichever of those three you picked.
Section 6	Signature.

What gets this one rejected

•Assuming you can change your mind later. The form warns that the department will not honour a change of plate selection or configuration, or a request for refund, after the application is submitted.
•Retaining a plate and then forgetting about it. The form is explicit: you may be subject to annual retention fees if you do not immediately place the plates on another vehicle.
•Using it for a special recognition plate. Those go on the REG 17A.
•Leaving a personalised plate on a car you have sold. It stays registered to you, and so does everything the new owner does under it.

Rules that decide whether it is accepted

•The rule in the DMV's own words. Special Interest License Plates belong to the license plate owner, not the vehicle. When selling your vehicle you may remove and reassign them to another vehicle immediately, retain them for future use, or surrender them to the department.
•Ordinary plates are the opposite. A standard California plate belongs to the car and stays bolted to it. Do not pull those off - a buyer driving away with no plates has a problem you handed them.

Every line here was read off REG 17 (Rev 2/2025) itself — the PDF is here — and off the California Department of Motor Vehicles pages. This is plain-language help with a form, not legal advice, and where our wording and the agency's differ, theirs governs.

Forms that go with this one

REG 156 · Application for Replacement Plates, Stickers, Documents

Before a personalised plate moves to your next car, see what is tied to the plate in San Francisco: the FasTrak account and the SFMTA residential parking permit.

Back to all California seller paperwork, or what selling a car in California involves.

How to fill out California REG 17

What a completed one looks like

Every line, in the order you meet it

The four boxes at the top

Section 1, which plate you already hold

Section 4, the plate and the car it comes off

Retain, surrender, or release to the new owner

Section 5, purchaser or holder

True full name

Street address, city, state and zip

Section 6, signature

What goes where

What gets this one rejected

Rules that decide whether it is accepted

Forms that go with this one

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