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DUI special license plate costs: impounded plates, a $50 Minnesota fee, Ohio's yellow plates
Most DUI licence consequences happen on a plastic card. Two states put the consequence on the car itself. Our immobilization guide prices Florida's order that a vehicle sit unused; this page prices the plate version — Minnesota's impoundment of the vehicle's registration plates and the special series that replaces them, and Ohio's restricted yellow plates — including the one fee a statute actually publishes.
Minnesota impounds the plate, then sells the replacement
Minnesota Statutes section 169A.60 is an administrative plate-impoundment scheme that runs alongside the criminal DWI case. A peace officer issues a plate impoundment order for a vehicle involved in a plate impoundment violation — which the statute defines to include a qualifying impaired-driving violation within ten years of a qualified prior incident, a violation at an alcohol concentration of 0.20 or more in the older statutory text reproduced in code references, licence revocation for test failure or refusal, and driving after revocation in the circumstances the section lists. The order reaches the vehicle, not only the driver: plates can be impounded from a car the violator was driving even where someone else owns it, with statutory routes for an owner who was not the violator.
Subdivision 13 is where the money is. At any time during the impoundment period, a violator or registered owner may apply to the commissioner for new registration plates, and the commissioner may issue special registration plates — the W-series plates Minnesota drivers call whiskey plates — on payment of a fee the statute's published text states as $50 for each vehicle for which special plates are requested. The per-vehicle wording matters: a household with two vehicles inside an impoundment order pays the fee twice, once per vehicle, and that arithmetic is the statute's own, not an estimate built on this page.
The statute also draws the exit lines. New ordinary plates may not be issued for the vehicle until at least one year from the date of the impoundment order, and where the owner is the violator, not until that person has been reissued a valid driver's licence. The commissioner must issue new plates in the cases the subdivision lists, including where the impoundment order is rescinded or the vehicle is transferred in compliance with subdivision 14, which restricts selling a vehicle that is under an impoundment order or wearing the special series. Filing a false statement under the section is itself priced by the criminal law the statute cross-references, rather than by a fee.
The plate components that are published
Ohio's half of this page is the cautionary half. Ohio Revised Code section 4503.231 requires restricted license plates — a different colour from those regularly issued, with a special serial number readily identified by law enforcement; in practice the yellow plates with red lettering Ohio drivers call party plates — on vehicles whose plates have been impounded, and as a condition of limited driving privileges where a court imposes it. The section publishes no BMV fee figure in its text, so none is quoted for Ohio: the priced Ohio component is the offence for violating the section, which the statute grades as a minor misdemeanor without printing a dollar amount in the section itself.
| DUI component | Published amount |
|---|---|
| Minnesota special registration plates (Minn. Stat. § 169A.60, subd. 13) | $50 fee for each vehicle for which special plates are requested, stated in the statute |
| Minnesota plate impoundment duration (§ 169A.60, subd. 13) | No new ordinary plates until at least 1 year from the impoundment order; a violator-owner must also have been reissued a valid driver's licence |
| Ohio restricted plates (Ohio Rev. Code § 4503.231(A)) | Restricted plates of a different colour with a special serial number required on impounded-plate vehicles and under limited-privilege orders; no plate fee figure is published in the section — none quoted |
| Ohio violation of the plate requirement (§ 4503.231(C)) | Guilty of a minor misdemeanor under the section; the section prints no dollar figure, and none is borrowed from other Ohio schedules |
| Driving the vehicle on ordinary plates during impoundment | Prohibited by both schemes; the consequence runs through the underlying licence and impoundment law priced in the state breakdowns, not through a plate tariff |
Sources: Minnesota Statutes § 169A.60, subdivisions 1, 13 and 14; Ohio Revised Code § 4503.231. Last verified: October 2026.
The fine is one line in a longer stack — court costs, program fees, interlock, supervision and reinstatement all bill separately. Price the layers that apply to your case in the calculator.
Open the DUI cost calculatorWhat plate schemes do not publish
Neither statute prices the experience around the plate. Minnesota's $50 is a plate fee, not a case fee: the reinstatement layer that returns the driver's own licence, the interlock layer that our interlock guide prices, and any programme orders in the criminal case all bill separately under their own authorities. Ohio's section likewise says nothing about what a deputy registrar charges to issue a set of restricted plates in a given county, and because that charge is not in the section named on this page, it is described as an issuance charge set outside the statute rather than given a number.
The non-monetary cost is the point of both schemes and is worth stating plainly, because it explains why legislatures chose plates over fines. A special-series plate announces the vehicle's history to every officer behind it, for the whole impoundment period, on every vehicle the order reaches. That visibility is the sanction's design, not a side effect — and it is also why the transfer and false-statement rules exist, to stop the plate being shed by selling the car inside the family or household.
Readers comparing states should note how short the list of plate states is. Most states answer a repeat or high-concentration DUI with the licence, interlock and vehicle-immobilisation components priced elsewhere on this site, and never touch the registration plate at all. This page prices the two statutory schemes verified for it and does not suggest a national plate practice that does not exist.
Common questions
- How much are Minnesota whiskey plates?
- Minnesota Statutes § 169A.60, subdivision 13, states a fee of $50 for each vehicle for which special registration plates are requested during a plate impoundment period.
- How long does Minnesota plate impoundment last?
- New ordinary plates may not be issued until at least one year from the date of the impoundment order, and a violator who owns the vehicle must also have been reissued a valid driver's licence.
- What does Ohio charge for party plates?
- Ohio Revised Code § 4503.231, which creates the restricted-plate requirement, publishes no fee figure in its text, so this page quotes none. Violating the section is a minor misdemeanor under § 4503.231(C).
Related cost guides: DUI vehicle immobilization costs, DUI vehicle forfeiture costs, Minnesota DUI penalties breakdown, Ohio DUI penalties breakdown.
Sources: Minnesota Statutes § 169A.60; Ohio Revised Code § 4503.231. Last verified: October 2026. This page is educational information about costs only — not legal advice. Laws and fees change; confirm current figures with your court and your state's driver-licensing agency.