California is running out of license number combinations, making for wheelie quite a lot of cars

License plates on wood builiding in Bar Harbor. — (Image credit: Atlantide Phototravel via Getty Images)

Okay, I admit it—I name my drafts 'final,' 'final-1,' and 'final-FINAL-for real this time.' Hey, once you come up with a naming convention that works for you, it makes sense to just stick with it… and stick with it. That is, until Windows hits you with the 'a file with the same name already exists' dialogue box, which only makes me thankful that I'm not in charge of issuing designations on any grand scale—like license plate numbers.

Since 1980, the state of California has issued new license plate numbers for non-commercial vehicles based on a simple convention: one number, three letters, and finally three numbers. Unfortunately, if the state sticks to this, it'll run out of possible combinations by the end of the year (via TechSpot).

I'm really bad at maths, but that suggests there are a lot of cars in the state of California, presenting a horror story for both maths nerds and climate scientists alike. Thankfully, the state is going to do something about it—the license plate situation, I mean—by simply reversing the current order of numbers and letters.

Which… feels a bit like kicking the can another 45 years down the road. As TechSpot highlights, simply switching things up by allowing the seven characters on a California license plate to be either a letter or a number would then allow for 78 billion possible combinations. If the state runs out then, well, we'll all have bigger fish to fry in the toxic atmosphere.

The Sacramento Bee reported on the issue last year, saying in June 2024 that the California Department of Motor Vehicles only had about 18 months left of license plate numbers based on the old system. They too wrote that the final license plate using the old system—9ZZZ999, if you're wondering—was expected to be issued some time in 2025, but interestingly note that estimates from as recently as December 2023 had previously suggested this wouldn't happen until 2027.

The reason for this is that, following an understandable slowdown during the Covid-19 pandemic, sales figures for new vehicles in early 2024 accelerated to pre-2020 numbers.

Like I said, that's a whole lotta cars whether you're a number fiend or not. Now, far be it for me, perched beside my power-hungry desktop tower, to harp on the environmental impact of this… but we also can't kick that can down the road either. As fun as it is to shotgun blast the effects of climate change in Kill the Tornado or enjoy a little zen moment cleaning up oil seeping into the ocean in Spilled!, the reality bearing down on all of us cannot be ignored.

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Jess has been writing about games for over ten years, spending the last seven working on print publications PLAY and Official PlayStation Magazine. When she’s not writing about all things hardware here, she’s getting cosy with a horror classic, ranting about a cult hit to a captive audience, or tinkering with some tabletop nonsense.