Statutory fee caps · DVSA test classes
Class 7 MOT cost, and which vans actually need one
A Class 7 test is capped at £58.60 and most garages charge £40 to £55. Whether your van needs one depends on a single number in its paperwork — not on the model, whatever the lists elsewhere tell you.
Statutory capsNo sign-upFree to cite
A Class 7 MOT covers goods vehicles with a design gross weight over 3,000kg and up to 3,500kg. The fee is capped by law at £58.60, and garages typically charge between £40 and £55. The threshold is the manufacturer’s design weight, not what the van weighs empty or on the day of the test.
£58.60
the legal maximum a garage can charge, unchanged for over fifteen years — most charge £40 to £55
3,000kg
design gross weight is the dividing line: at or below is Class 4, above is Class 7
£3.75
the difference between the two caps — far less than most people expect, and rarely what you actually pay
What’s on this page
Most guides to Class 7 answer the question by listing models: this van is Class 7, that one is Class 4. Those lists disagree with one another, and they disagree because the question cannot be answered by model. The same nameplate is sold in variants on both sides of the 3,000kg line.
This page tells you where the answer actually lives, why the shortcut fails, and what it costs either way. It also brings something the other guides do not have: what those vans go on to do at the test, taken from the national record of every MOT carried out in Great Britain.
Fee caps and class definitions on this page come from the DVSA MOT inspection manual for private passenger and light commercial vehicles and the published fee schedule, which apply in England, Scotland and Wales. Northern Ireland operates a separate system administered by the DVA under different arrangements. Failure data comes from our analysis of the DVSA MOT testing dataset. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
What it costs
The figure most people look for is the cap, which is the maximum a test station may lawfully charge. It is not what you will pay, and the gap between the two is larger than the gap between the classes.
| Test class | What it covers | Legal maximum |
|---|---|---|
| Class 4 | Cars and goods vehicles up to 3,000kg design gross weight | £54.85 |
| Class 7 | Goods vehicles over 3,000kg and up to 3,500kg | £58.60 |
| Class 5 | Passenger vehicles with more than twelve seats | £59.55–£80.65 |
| Class 1 and 2 | Motorcycles | £29.65 |
Statutory maximum fees set by the DVSA. A test station may charge less than the cap but never more. Source: published DVSA fee schedule.
The difference between the classes is £3.75
A Class 7 test is capped at £58.60 and a Class 4 at £54.85. That is three pounds and seventy-five pence, on caps that most garages do not charge anyway. If you have been told a Class 7 is significantly more expensive, that is not what the fee schedule says.
In practice a Class 7 usually costs between £40 and £55, and a Class 4 between £30 and £45. The overlap is real: a well-priced Class 7 can cost less than a poorly-priced Class 4.
It is not the fee. It is availability. A Class 7 test needs a bay sized for the vehicle and equipment rated for the higher axle loads, so far fewer stations are approved to carry one out. That limits your choice of garage, and a limited choice is what pushes a price towards the cap rather than away from it.
It also means less flexibility on timing. A station that does Class 7 on two days a week is a station where a failed test costs you more in waiting than in parts.
The cap has not moved in a long time
The £58.60 figure has been unchanged for over fifteen years. In real terms the maximum a station can charge for a Class 7 test has fallen considerably over that period, which is part of why so many garages price well below it and treat the test as a route to the repair work rather than as revenue in itself.
For the equivalent figures on cars and what actually drives the price you are quoted, see our MOT cost guide.
What the fee does not include
The test fee buys the inspection and nothing else. Any repair, adjustment or diagnostic work is separate, and on a van the categories that fail most often are the expensive ones. Suspension and axles account for the largest share of van failures, followed by brakes — both workshop jobs with parts and labour attached.
What those repairs cost is set out under repair costs, and what tends to fail at each age of van is covered in the van MOT checklist.
Why model lists get it wrong
Search for which vans need a Class 7 test and you will find lists of models. Compare two of those lists and you will find they disagree — including about the same model, stated with equal confidence on both sides.
One widely-read guide states that a standard long-wheelbase, high-roof Transit Custom falls into Class 7 even when empty. Another states that a Transit Custom needs a Class 4. Neither is being careless. They are describing different variants of the same nameplate, and both can be correct.
Manufacturers sell the same model badge across a range of plated weights. A Transit is sold in variants from well under 3,000kg to the full 3,500kg. So is a Vivaro, a Trafic, a Boxer and most of the market. The badge on the back tells you nothing about which side of the line the vehicle sits.
Two vans parked next to each other, identical model, identical body length, can require different test classes because one is plated at 2,900kg and the other at 3,200kg. That is not an edge case. It is how the market is built.
What decides it
One number: design gross weight. It is the maximum weight at which the manufacturer designed the vehicle to operate, including the vehicle itself, everyone in it, the fuel and the load. Up to and including 3,000kg is Class 4. Above 3,000kg and up to 3,500kg is Class 7.
Depending on where you look it may be labelled gross vehicle weight, maximum authorised mass, revenue weight or something similar. They refer to the same thing. What none of them refer to is the weight of the empty van, or what it happens to weigh on the day.
Short-wheelbase panel vans
Usually, though not always, plated below 3,000kg and therefore Class 4. The shorter the body and the lower the roof, the more likely this is — but it is a tendency, not a rule.
Long-wheelbase and Luton bodies
More often plated at or near 3,500kg, putting them in Class 7. A Luton or box body on a chassis cab is the most likely configuration to be over the line.
Pickups
Frequently plated under 3,000kg despite their size, which puts many of them in Class 4. This surprises people who assume a large pickup must be the heavier class.
Where our data does and does not help
We hold the national record of every MOT carried out in Great Britain and have used it to rank vans by failure rate, but that record as we process it does not retain which class of test was carried out. So we cannot tell you what proportion of any model is Class 7, and neither, on the published evidence, can anyone else.
What we can tell you is how the models commonly found in this weight range behave at the test. Among vans aged three to six years, the Boxer records a 22.75% failure rate, the Crafter 24.99%, the Sprinter 25.18%, the Transit 26.35% and the Movano 28.62%. Whichever class your van falls into, that spread is a larger factor in what the test will cost you than the £3.75 difference in the fee.
The full ranking across thirty-two models, and how it shifts as vehicles age, is in which vans hold up best.
How to check yours
Two places hold the number, and they should agree. It takes about a minute, and it is the only way to answer the question with certainty for your particular vehicle.
The manufacturer’s plate
A metal or sticker plate carrying the vehicle identification number and a set of weights. On most vans it sits in the driver’s door pillar, visible with the door open; on some it is under the bonnet or on the engine bay bulkhead.
Fastest option if the van is in front of youThe V5C registration document
Look for a field described as revenue weight or gross weight, given in kilograms. Not the mass in service, and not the unladen weight — those are different figures on the same document.
Use this if you are buying and the van is not with youThe manufacturer’s plate usually carries four weights in a column. The first is the maximum weight of the vehicle itself — that is the one that decides the test class. The second is the maximum weight of the vehicle plus a trailer, and it is always higher.
Reading the second line instead of the first is the single most common error here, and it will tell you the van is far heavier than it is. If the number you have found is above 3,500kg on an ordinary van, you have almost certainly read the train weight. The two lines below it are permitted axle loads, which are not relevant to the class.
Reading the answer
| Design gross weight | Test class | Fee cap |
|---|---|---|
| Up to 3,000kg | Class 4 | £54.85 |
| 3,001kg to 3,500kg | Class 7 | £58.60 |
| Above 3,500kg | Not an MOT at all | separate schedule |
Vehicles above 3,500kg design gross weight sit outside the MOT system entirely and go through an annual goods vehicle test administered by the DVSA at its own testing stations, with its own fees and certificate. Source: published DVSA fee schedule and inspection manual.
If the two sources disagree
Occasionally the plate and the V5C do not match, usually because a vehicle has been re-plated at a different weight during its life — something done to bring a van under a licensing or driving entitlement threshold. If that has happened, the plate on the vehicle is what a tester works from, and it is worth having the paperwork that supports the change.
A test station will confirm the class before booking if you give them the registration. Testing a vehicle in the wrong class is treated seriously by the DVSA, so a garage has every reason to check rather than guess.
Entering a registration on this site returns the vehicle’s full MOT history: every test, every result, every advisory and the recorded mileage at each. That is the most useful thing available for judging a specific van, and it is free.
It does not return the test class, because the national data as published does not carry that field in a form we can rely on. For the class, use the plate or the V5C. For everything about what the vehicle has actually done, check the registration.
What differs from Class 4
Less than most people assume in what gets inspected, and more than most people assume in where you can get it done. The inspection is the same document; the building is not.
| Class 4 | Class 7 | |
|---|---|---|
| Design gross weight | Up to 3,000kg | 3,001kg to 3,500kg |
| Fee cap | £54.85 | £58.60 |
| Frequency | Annual, first at three years | Annual, first at three years |
| Inspection manual | The same document | The same document |
| Stations able to test | Most garages | Far fewer |
Source: published DVSA fee schedule and the MOT inspection manual for private passenger and light commercial vehicles.
The inspection is the same
Both classes are tested against the same DVSA inspection manual, covering brakes, steering, suspension, tyres, lamps, visibility, structure and emissions. A tester works from identical criteria whichever class the vehicle falls into.
What changes is the equipment doing the measuring. A Class 7 bay needs a brake roller rated for higher axle loads and a lift capable of taking the weight, and brake efficiency is assessed against the vehicle’s own permitted weights rather than a car’s. The standard is the same; the machine has to be bigger.
The building is the real constraint
A Class 7 bay has to be physically larger than a Class 4 one — wider stall, taller entrance, more clearance around the vehicle. Fitting a van with a high roof onto a lift and still having room to work above it is not something every workshop can offer.
That is why far fewer stations hold a Class 7 approval, and it is the practical difference that will affect you. Not the £3.75 on the cap, but a shorter list of garages, fewer available slots, and less room to shop around on price.
On a car, a failure usually means driving to whichever nearby garage can fit you in. On a van in Class 7 the same failure can mean waiting for a slot at one of a handful of stations in your area, with the vehicle off the road in the meantime.
For anyone whose van is how they earn, the cost of that wait is usually larger than the repair. Booking early, while the existing certificate still has weeks to run, is the cheapest insurance available and it costs nothing.
Above 3,500kg is a different system entirely
A vehicle plated above 3,500kg does not take an MOT of any class. It goes through an annual goods vehicle test administered by the DVSA at its own testing stations, with a separate fee schedule, separate criteria and a separate certificate.
This catches people converting or re-plating vehicles, and it matters when buying: a van at 3,500kg is the heaviest vehicle that can still be tested through the ordinary garage network. One kilogram above that and the whole arrangement changes.
A DVSA special notice extends the upper Class 7 limit to 4,250kg, but only for qualifying zero-emission goods vehicles. The extra allowance exists because battery packs add weight that would otherwise push an electric van out of the class its diesel equivalent sits in.
It applies in England, Scotland and Wales, and only to vehicles meeting the qualifying conditions. A diesel van at 4,250kg remains outside the MOT system.
Three things that are not true
All three circulate widely, all three come up in garage forecourts, and one of them costs people money every year.
A Class 7 van needs testing every six months
It does not. A Class 7 MOT is annual, exactly like a Class 4, with the first test due three years after registration. There is no six-month requirement anywhere in the MOT system.
The belief comes from three real things that are not MOTs. Heavier goods vehicles above 3,500kg take an annual DVSA test on a different schedule. Operators holding a goods vehicle operator’s licence must carry out safety inspections at set intervals, often six-weekly or shorter, and those are a licensing obligation rather than a test. And some insurers and contract customers impose their own inspection requirements on vehicles used in their work.
All three are genuine. None of them means your van needs two MOTs a year. If you have been paying for one, you have been paying for something the law does not ask of you.
If a garage has been testing your van twice a year, look at the certificates. Two full MOTs twelve months apart with an extra inspection in between is one thing; two MOTs six months apart is money spent on a test that was not due.
You can see every test your vehicle has ever taken, with dates and results, by entering the registration on our history check. It is free and takes a few seconds.
It depends on what the van weighs
It depends on what the manufacturer designed it to weigh when fully loaded, which is a fixed number stamped on a plate. An empty Class 7 van is still Class 7. A Class 4 van loaded to the roof is still Class 4.
Nobody puts the vehicle on a weighbridge to decide the class, and nothing you take out of the back will move it into a cheaper one. The only way the figure changes is formal re-plating, which is a paperwork exercise with its own consequences for what licence you need to drive it.
Class 7 is the expensive test
The caps differ by £3.75, and neither is what most garages charge. A Class 7 typically comes in between £40 and £55, and a Class 4 between £30 and £45. The ranges overlap, so a competitively priced Class 7 can cost less than a Class 4 at a garage that charges near the cap.
Where Class 7 does cost more is in choice. Fewer stations are approved, which means fewer quotes to compare and fewer slots when something goes wrong.
Across every van in the national record, the fee is a small fraction of what a test costs once repairs are counted. Suspension and axles are the largest category of failed items, and among vans aged three to six the failure rate ranges from 15.94% on the best model to 31.63% on the worst.
A sixteen-point spread in whether the vehicle passes at all matters considerably more than £3.75 on the fee. What fails, and at what age, is covered in the van MOT checklist.
Booking the right test
The hard part is not the price. It is finding a station that can physically take the vehicle, and doing it early enough that a failure does not leave the van standing.
Confirm the class first
Check the plate or the V5C before you ring anyone. A garage that discovers on the day that your van is Class 7 and their bay is not approved for it cannot test the vehicle, and you have lost a morning.
How to read the plateUse the whole month
You can test up to a month minus one day before the current certificate expires while keeping the same anniversary date. On a van with fewer available stations, that window is worth more than it is on a car.
Ask about a retest slot
Before booking, ask what happens if it fails. A station that can retest within a few days is worth more than one charging a few pounds less with a two-week wait.
Matters most on Class 7Why fewer stations is the real problem
A Class 7 bay has to be wider and taller than a Class 4 one, with a lift and brake rollers rated for the weight. Plenty of good garages simply do not have the building for it, which is why the list of places that can test your van is shorter than the list that can test your car.
The practical consequence shows up when something goes wrong. A failure on a car means driving to whoever can fit you in; a failure on a Class 7 van can mean waiting for a slot while the vehicle sits. Booking early is the only part of that you control.
Before you book, know what is likely to fail
Suspension and axles are the largest single category of failed items on vans, and what fails changes substantially with the age of the vehicle — suspension and structure make up around 30% of failures on an older van against 18% on a young one. The van MOT checklist sets out what to check at each age, and what the MOT actually inspects covers the whole test section by section.
If the van has advisories on its last certificate, those are worth reading before booking rather than after. Advisories on vans turn into failures more often than on cars, which we set out in the van advisory index. The full history for any registration, including every advisory ever recorded, is in the free history check.
If you are buying rather than testing
Weight class is worth checking before you commit, because it affects where you can get the vehicle tested for as long as you own it. Beyond that, which model you choose matters more than the class: the failure rate across thirty-two vans ranges from 15.94% to 31.63% at three to six years old, as set out in which vans hold up best. For how vans compare with cars, see the comparison against cars, and for what the odometer should read, average van mileage.
Enter your registration and postcode to see which garages near you are equipped for the vehicle, and what they charge. No pre-payment, and you deal with the garage directly.
Compare live quotesWe earn a commission if you book through this link, at no cost to you. It does not affect which garages you are shown or what they charge. Our funding page explains how the site pays for itself. Fees for other classes are in the MOT cost guide, and servicing intervals in the service cost guide.
Sources and method
This page draws on two different kinds of source, and they carry different weight. The regulatory figures are published facts; the failure figures are our own analysis. Both are set out below, along with what neither can tell you.
The regulatory figures
Fee caps, weight thresholds and class definitions come from the DVSA’s published fee schedule and its inspection manual for private passenger and light commercial vehicles. These are statutory maximums, not estimates: a test station may charge less than the cap and may not charge more.
They apply in England, Scotland and Wales. Northern Ireland runs a separate system administered by the DVA, with its own fees and arrangements, and nothing on this page describes it.
The failure figures
Failure rates come from our analysis of the DVSA MOT testing dataset, published as open data: 829,654,015 tests across 137,840,356 vehicles. We use tests carried out by DVSA only, and only outcomes recorded as a pass or a fail. Thirty-two commercial models were classified from the vehicle record.
What this page cannot tell you
We do not hold the test class. This is the most important limitation on the page. The national dataset as we process it does not retain which class of test was carried out, so every failure figure here is per model, never per class. We cannot tell you how vehicles in Class 7 perform against vehicles in Class 4, and we do not claim to.
Your vehicle, not a model average. The class depends on one number on your particular van. Two identical-looking vehicles of the same model can fall either side of the line, which is the whole argument of this page and applies to our own figures as much as to anyone else’s.
Caps change. The figures quoted are the maximums in force. They have been stable for a long time but they are set by the DVSA and can be revised, so the published schedule is the authority rather than this page.
Market prices are ranges, not quotes. The £40 to £55 range for a Class 7 test reflects what garages commonly charge. It is not a quote, and availability affects price more than anything else on a class with fewer approved stations.
Category, not component. Where we describe what fails vans, figures are aggregated at the level of the inspection category rather than the individual defect. Nothing here names a specific part as the likely cause.
On the disagreement between published model lists
Section two notes that widely-read guides give conflicting answers about which class a given model needs, including opposite answers for the same model. We have not named them, because the point is not that any one of them is careless.
The point is structural: a nameplate spans variants on both sides of a weight threshold, so any list organised by model will be right for some vehicles and wrong for others. We have declined to publish our own list for the same reason. If you find one elsewhere, check it against the plate on your vehicle rather than the other way round.
Free to cite
Every figure on this page may be reproduced in any publication with attribution. No permission is needed and nothing sits behind a form. If a different cut of the underlying data would be more useful, we will produce it on request.
Suggested citation: PriceMyRepair, Class 7 MOT cost, and which vans actually need one. Fee caps from the published DVSA schedule; failure data from our analysis of the DVSA MOT testing dataset. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
We are not affiliated with the DVSA, the DVLA or any garage group. The analysis, the classifications and any errors in them are ours alone. Corrections are welcome and will be published on this page rather than made silently.
Questions
What people ask about Class 7 tests, including the three misconceptions that come up most often.
How much does a Class 7 MOT cost?
The legal maximum is £58.60, and most garages charge between £40 and £55. A station may charge less than the cap but never more. The fee covers the inspection only — any repairs, adjustments or diagnostic work are separate.
How much more expensive is Class 7 than Class 4?
£3.75 on the caps: £58.60 against £54.85. In practice a Class 7 typically costs £40 to £55 and a Class 4 £30 to £45, so the ranges overlap and a competitively priced Class 7 can cost less than a Class 4 at a garage charging near its cap.
Which vans need a Class 7 MOT?
Any goods vehicle with a design gross weight over 3,000kg and up to 3,500kg. It cannot be answered by model, because manufacturers sell the same nameplate in variants on both sides of that line. Published lists of Class 7 models contradict one another for exactly that reason.
Does a Class 7 van need testing every six months?
No. A Class 7 MOT is annual, the same as Class 4, with the first test due three years after registration. The belief comes from three real but separate things: the annual test for vehicles above 3,500kg, the periodic safety inspections required under a goods vehicle operator’s licence, and requirements imposed by some insurers or contract customers. None of them is an MOT.
Is the Class 7 test itself different?
Both classes are inspected against the same DVSA manual covering brakes, steering, suspension, tyres, lamps, visibility, structure and emissions. What differs is the equipment: a Class 7 bay needs a larger stall, a lift rated for the weight and brake rollers suited to higher axle loads. The criteria are the same; the machinery has to be bigger.
Why does nobody publish a reliable list of Class 7 models?
Because a model badge covers a range of plated weights. A Transit is sold in variants from well under 3,000kg to the full 3,500kg, and so is most of the market. Two vans of the same model and body length can need different test classes because one is plated at 2,900kg and the other at 3,200kg. Any list organised by model will be right for some vehicles and wrong for others.
Does it depend on how much my van weighs?
No. It depends on design gross weight, which is the maximum weight the manufacturer designed the vehicle to operate at, including the vehicle, occupants, fuel and load. An empty Class 7 van is still Class 7, and a fully loaded Class 4 van is still Class 4. Nothing you take out of the back changes the class.
Where do I find the design gross weight?
Two places. The manufacturer’s plate, usually in the driver’s door pillar or under the bonnet, carrying the vehicle identification number and a set of weights. Or the V5C registration document, in a field described as revenue weight or gross weight. The two should agree.
The plate shows several weights. Which one matters?
The first figure in the column is the maximum weight of the vehicle itself, and that is the one that decides the class. The second is the maximum weight of the vehicle plus a trailer and is always higher; reading it by mistake is the most common error here. The two figures below are permitted axle loads, which are not relevant. If you have found a number above 3,500kg on an ordinary van, you have almost certainly read the train weight.
What happens if my van is over 3,500kg?
It leaves the MOT system entirely. Vehicles above 3,500kg design gross weight take an annual goods vehicle test administered by the DVSA at its own testing stations, with a separate fee schedule, separate criteria and a separate certificate. A van plated at 3,500kg is the heaviest vehicle that can still be tested through the ordinary garage network.
Is the limit really 4,250kg now?
Only for qualifying zero-emission goods vehicles. A DVSA special notice extends the upper Class 7 limit to 4,250kg for those, because battery weight would otherwise push an electric van out of the class its diesel equivalent sits in. A diesel van at 4,250kg remains outside the MOT system.
Why are there so few Class 7 test stations?
A Class 7 bay has to be physically larger than a Class 4 one, with a wider stall, a taller entrance and equipment rated for the weight. Many good garages simply do not have the building for it. The practical consequence is fewer quotes to compare, fewer available slots, and a longer wait if the vehicle fails.
Can I check my van’s test class online?
Not reliably, and we do not offer it. The national MOT data as published does not carry the test class in a form that can be depended on for an individual vehicle, so the plate or the V5C remains the answer. What you can check online is the vehicle’s full test history: every test, every result, every advisory and the recorded mileage, free and without signing up.
Does any of this apply in Northern Ireland?
No. Northern Ireland operates a separate testing system administered by the DVA, with its own fees, classes and booking arrangements. The figures on this page cover England, Scotland and Wales only.