Idaho no longer requires a face plate if you don’t have an underwire – Jalopnik

Auto designers are still baffled about how to handle front license plates, but Idaho has a solution that’s unique among the 50 states. If your car does not have a front license plate holder, you no longer need to attach a front license plate. Senate Bill 1180 came into force on July 1, 2025, but is recent Idaho News 6 The report has brought this loophole to wider attention.

“You get two license plates regardless of whether your car needs one or two,” said Britt Rosenthal of the Idaho Division of Motor Vehicles. “Many cars these days are electric or hybrid and don’t come with a bracket. So rather than forcing people to compromise the front of their car, they simply don’t have to have a license plate if there isn’t room for it.”

Contrary to what Rosenthal claims, the front plate situation is not unique to electric cars and hybrids.

Alejandro Montalvan, who has run Advantage Auto Sales in Garden City for more than a decade, remembers getting a reminder about the change from the Idaho Transportation Department.
“So here we have a Dodge Charger. This one doesn’t have the bracket,” Montalvan said.
When asked how many cars on his lots do not have brackets, Montalvan estimated a figure of 20%.

The police obviously don’t like this, because it makes both manual and automatic detection difficult. Additionally, they insist that if your car has a front plate bracket, you are still required to put the plate on the car. Idaho will continue to issue two license plates whether you need a front plate or not, which is a big use of resources.

By our recent count, 29 states plus Washington DC require front license plates, although Idaho now falls into a gray area with this new law. Almost every other country in the world requires both front and back plates. Cars certainly look better without them, but when they’re required by law almost everywhere, it’s strange that car designers don’t seem to realize that front license plates exist.

When Massachusetts started issuing front fascias in the early 1990s, I took my first car, a 1982 Pontiac 6000LE, to the dealer to find out how to install them. They didn’t know. At the other extreme, when I bought my 2014 Subaru BRZ new, also in Massachusetts, the dealer was surprised that I actually wanted the stock front fascia bracket installed. No, the car didn’t look that good, but it was the law, and I was tired of constantly trying to keep up the “it just fell off, cop” spiel like I had done with my Miatas for years.

With Idaho’s solution, I expect enthusiasts will rush to remove their brackets so they no longer have to show a faceplate. The law doesn’t say anything about removing them from cars that already have them, only that vehicles without brackets don’t need a front plate. If you buy a new one and the dealer offers to install one, you can politely decline and be completely legal without it. Besides eliminating front plates altogether, as is the case in 21 states, this is the best solution to maintaining a car’s good looks.