Registering a Vehicle in Monaco: Procedure, Documents and Fees

The office you are dealing with

Every vehicle kept in Monaco is registered by a single government department: the Service des Titres de Circulation (STC), known in English as the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Office. It sits under the Ministry of Public Works, the Environment and Urban Development, and it issues registration certificates and plates, runs the technical inspection centre, and examines and issues driving licences.

It is not the Mairie and not the Sûreté Publique, and no part of the file goes through a French préfecture. Since the department's move, the public counter is at:

Service des Titres de Circulation — 5 Promenade Honoré II, Hall B, 6th floor, 98000 Monaco Telephone (+377) 98 98 80 14 · circulation@gouv.mc Monday to Friday, 9.30 am to 5 pm, by appointment only

Appointments are booked on the government teleservice at teleservice.gouv.mc/rendez-vous-service-titres-circulation/, by email or by phone. Turning up without one will not get you served, and you need a second appointment to collect the finished documents.

Who can register

That last line matters, because it is widely misreported. Monaco does register vehicles for people who own or rent a home in the Principality without living there. The vehicle must be under 3.5 tonnes, a dedicated parking space must be evidenced for each one, and the certificate carries the mention non résident. Family members housed at the same address can register on an attestation d'hébergement. If the owner later obtains a carte de séjour, the registration has to be converted to the ordinary series.

For proof of address the STC is strict about what it accepts: an SMEG electricity bill or a registered lease. Bank statements and phone bills are not substitutes.

The core file

Whatever the vehicle, the file is built around form STC001, completed and signed in original. To it you add:

• Your identity document in the form appropriate to your status above
• Proof of ownership — the sales invoice, showing a sequential invoice number, the identity of seller and buyer, the vehicle description with its serial number, and the amount
• Payment: cash, cheque, Visa or Mastercard

Any document not drawn up in French or issued in Monaco or France must be accompanied by a translation from a translator sworn before a court of appeal in Monaco or in France. A translation done privately, or by an agency abroad, will be refused.

A new vehicle

Add to the core file:

• The original full European certificate of conformity issued by the manufacturer — not a copy, and not a partial extract
• Documentation of any modification made to the vehicle

Where the car comes from outside the EC customs territory, you also produce the customs receipt (form 846A). Where it comes from another EC state, you produce a VAT certificate from the Monaco Tax Department (Direction des Services Fiscaux), which is the step people forget. Monaco is inside the EU customs territory and applies French customs rules under the customs union, but its VAT is administered locally.

In practice a Monaco dealer assembles most of this for you and files it on your behalf. Buying abroad means doing it yourself.

A used vehicle

Add to the core file:

• The original registration certificate of the vehicle
• A technical inspection report less than six months old, if the vehicle is more than four years old
• If the vehicle comes from France, a certificat de situation administrative less than fifteen days old — the non-gage certificate confirming there is no lien or opposition on the car
• If it comes from anywhere else, either the EU VAT exemption certificate or the customs duty receipt (846A)
• For a collector's vehicle, an FFVE attestation or a certificate of historic interest from the manufacturer

What it costs in 2026

The tariff is fixed annually by Ministerial Order — the current one is AM 2025-709. The figures that apply to private owners:

Companies registering a véhicule de service of the "Véhicule Particulier" type pay on a fiscal-horsepower scale that climbs steeply — €477 up to 8 CV, €1,087 from 9 to 16 CV, €1,595 from 17 to 25 CV and €2,103 from 26 CV. Commercial vehicles, taxis and grande remise cars registered by a company stay at €122.

The plates themselves

Monegasque plates are 260 × 110 mm, with blue characters on a white reflective background. On the left sit the red-and-white Grimaldi arms and the country code MC. The registration is four characters: four digits, or three digits and a letter. The rear plate carries the legend PRINCIPAUTÉ DE MONACO along the bottom and, in the corner, the blue estampille — the annual validation sticker showing the year the registration runs to.

There is no EU blue band on a Monaco plate, and the numbering is not a rolling national sequence in the French sense. Series starting 000 are reserved for the Princely Family.

After you drive away

Registration is the beginning of a cycle, not the end of one. A Monegasque registration is valid only until 31 December of the current year and has to be renewed by paying for a new estampille, and the vehicle enters a periodic technical inspection cycle whose intervals differ from the French ones. Both are covered in Keeping a vehicle on the road in Monaco.

Third-party motor insurance is compulsory to drive in the Principality, and your driving licence is a separate matter with its own hard deadline — see Exchanging a foreign driving licence and The Monegasque driving licence. If you are arriving in Monaco, the wider sequence of formalities is set out in Moving to Monaco and The carte de séjour.