Your vehicle identification number, also known as your VIN, is something you may have to dig up from time to time.  It’s a 17-digit unique serial number that identifies your vehicle.

You may need it if you’re buying car insurance or if you're buying Toyota Tundra parts or other genuine Toyota parts.

How To Find Your VIN

Your VIN can be in one of several places.  Look for your VIN on:

  • The driver’s side of your dash
  • The inside of your driver’s side door

Additionally, you may want to check your vehicle registration as well as the vehicle title and registration.

What Does The VIN Mean?

Those 17-digits actually mean something. This other blog had a great diagram of a Toyota VIN.  You can see the VIN underlined in red below.

vin toyota

 

Here’s our translation of this VIN.

  • Digit #1 – This represents the country where the vehicle was manufactured.  1, 4, and 5 represent the United States.  2 is Canada.  3 is Mexico.  J is Japan.  K is Korea.  S is England.  W is Germany.
  • Digit #2 – This tells you who actually manufactured the vehicle.  T would be Toyota.  A stands for Audi.  B stands for BMW.  It goes on like this.
  • Digit #3 – This digit will tell you the type of vehicle.
  • Digits #4-9 – These give background information about the vehicle such as body type, transmission type, etc.
  • Digits #10-17 – These cover model years as well as the manufacturing plant location.

Take a look at your VIN and unlock its secrets. For even more tips on decoding a VIN number, check out this blog post, too.