These Illinois vanity license plates among 550 rejected in 2025 for ‘lewd lingo’
.jpg "Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias reported more than 550 vanity and personalized license plate requests were rejected in 2025, compared to 335 the previous year.")
Willing to pay extra to show off a unique license plate in Illinois? You may want to check this list of permanently banned phrases before applying.
The Illinois Secretary of State’s Office reports it received 55,690 requests for vanity and personalized license plates in 2025, and rejected more than 550. Common reasons for rejection include use of inflammatory, profane or offensive language, as well as plates that may be difficult to read, such as “MWMWMWM” or “OOQQOO.”
“Illinoisans consistently show off their creativity on customized license plates, but anything that hits the road has to meet the standards of good taste and decency,” Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias said in a Dec. 22 news release. “Our team is fluent in lewd lingo and sneaky swearing — and they catch it all. When a plate crosses the line, it goes straight onto our permanent rejection list.”
The 550-plus rejections last year mark a significant increase compared to the 335 denied in 2024. The office has rejected more than 8,558 vanity and personalized plate requests in total.
Here are some of the rejected requests for 2025:
- BBL
- BDASMOM
- BLUBALN
- BRICKED
- IBPOOPN
- ICUP
- PRIUSSY
- SNDNUDZ
- SYBAU
- TYPESHT
State officials report as of Dec. 22, 799,245 vehicles in Illinois display vanity or personalized plates.
Illinois regulations distinguish vanity plates from personalized plates. Vanity plates can only use letters, while personalized plates feature letters and numbers. Of the nearly 800,000 special plates in Illinois, 291,327 are vanity plates and 507,918 are personalized.
State law allows officials to deny any personalized or vanity license plate request that “creates a connotation that is offensive to good taste and decency,” is misleading or substantially interferes with plate identification for law enforcement purposes.
How much do vanity or personalized plates cost in IL?
A standard passenger random license plate for a vehicle that’s already titled costs $151 in Illinois, but additional fees apply for vanity and personalized plates. If you’ve just acquired your vehicle and are registering it for the first time, the title fee is an additional $165 in Illinois.
For vehicles that are already titled, initial issuance costs $245 for a vanity plate and $198 for a personalized plate. The annual renewal fee is $164 for vanity plates and $158 for personalized plates.
You can use an online Pick-A-Plate tool to check if your desired vanity or personalized plate combination is available.
After submitting an application with the required fee, you can expect to wait at least 60 to 90 days to receive your new personalized or vanity plate.
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