2026 UK Audit

Audit of licensed or SORN'd Honda VF1000 models registered with the Department for Transport, in the UK. Latest quarter: Q2 2026.

There were 461 Honda VF1000 motorcycles registered in the UK at the end of Q2 2026, an increase of 73 since the 2015 audit. The number actually road legal stands at 72, down from 86 in 2015.

The picture is more nuanced than a single quarter suggests. The total on the register has been broadly flat since 2022, after two decades of steady growth — fewer machines are being added to it. And the licensed count moves with the seasons: it rises each spring and falls each winter as owners tax and SORN their bikes. Comparing like with like, Q2 2015 (86 road legal) against Q2 2026 (72) still shows a long-term decline, but a gentler one than the quarter-on-quarter figures imply. The underlying story remains the one first noted in 2015: more of these bikes are being kept, restored and laid up than ridden — consistent with an ageing, increasingly collectible machine and a finite supply of parts.

These figures are drawn from the Department for Transport’s published vehicle licensing statistics, which now include per-model counts by licence status and are updated quarterly. Unlike the earlier audits on this site, no Freedom of Information request is required.

What “licensed” means here. The Department for Transport records only two states: licensed (holding a valid vehicle licence, so permitted on the road) and SORN (Statutory Off Road Notification — declared off the road). There is no roadworthiness field and no MOT field. VF1000s are now past the 40-year threshold for MOT exemption, so a licensed machine may not have been inspected for years. Licensed means taxed and permitted on the road — not recently tested.

A caveat for future comparisons. From 1 April 2026 vehicles built before 1 January 1986 can stop paying vehicle tax entirely (historic tax class, which must be applied for). Free tax gives owners a cost-free reason to licence a machine rather than declare it SORN. That change took effect during the quarter covered here, so part of the recent rise in licensed machines may reflect free taxation rather than more bikes actually being ridden. Separating the two is a task for future quarters.

See also the 2011 audit, the 2015 Q2 audit and the 2026 Germany audit.