Your Kia VIN is located on your insurance card and your driver’s side door jamb. It encodes information about your car like its country and plant of origin.

Written by Sarah Williams

Edited by Pat Roache

Updated on Apr 27, 2023

Table of Contents

How to check your Kia VIN
How to decode a Kia VIN
Positions 4-8: vehicle-specific information
Position 9: the VIN check digit
Position 10: model year
Position 11: assembly plant
Positions 12-17: vehicle serial number

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You can decode a

Kia

VIN by breaking down the 17-digit code, which represents the car’s country of origin, manufacturer, vehicle information, model year, and assembly plant.

Your Kia vehicle identification number (VIN) can be found either on the front sidewall of the engine bay, the top of the dashboard, or on the driver's side door jamb.
Your VIN contains coded information on the type of engine or transmission in your Kia, its country and manufacturing plant of origin, and its make, year, model, and body type.
You might need your VIN as part of the process to renew your driver’s license, update your vehicle’s registration, or sell your car.

How to check your Kia VIN

Your Kia’s VIN is its vehicle identification number: a unique string of 17 digits that identifies your car across legal documents and car history reports.

You can find your Kia VIN in the following locations:

Your

insurance card

Your DMV-issued

registration card

Punched on the front sidewall of the engine bay

At the top of your dashboard, where it meets the windshield

On the vehicle certification label found on the driver’s door jamb

A few circumstances when you may need a Kia VIN check include:

Buying a used car: Use a VIN lookup to generate a vehicle history report for a used Kia being

purchased from a private seller

Identifying a stolen vehicle: Your VIN helps law enforcement identify your Kia after you

report car theft

—especially if the license plates have been removed.

Selling a car: The VIN helps you identify your vehicle to prospective buyers and will need to be

listed on the bill of sale

Renewal documents: The DMV requires VINs when renewing your license or vehicle registration to keep all the documents in order.

NHTSA check: You can use the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) free VIN decoder to check your specific model’s information,

safety ratings

, and recall history.

MORE:

How to check car recalls by VIN

How to decode a Kia VIN

The 17-digits of your Kia VIN hold a universal set of meaning expressed through a combination of the following:

Numeric digits: 0 through 9

Letters of the alphabet: All except I, O, and Q (since these can be confused with numbers)

First position: country of origin

The first three digits are the world manufacturer identifier (WMI) code.

The first digit: Refers to the production location, or the country where the car was manufactured.

The United States is represented with a VIN code of 1 or 4, but you will likely see a “K” for Korea on your Kia.

Positions 2-3: manufacturer information

The following two digits represent identifying information with regard to the vehicle manufacturer:

The second digit: Refers to the brand of your car, which in this case will be an “N” for Kia.

The third digit: Indicates the vehicle type of your Kia. For a Kia Forte or Optima, you may see an A for passenger car.

Positions 4-8: vehicle-specific information

The following five digits of your vehicle’s VIN make up the Vehicle Descriptor Section (VDS). These specifications help to narrow down the specific model and trim configuration of the Kia car you are driving:

The fourth digit: Kia model

The fifth digit: The series of model or trim specification

The sixth and seventh digits: Body type (e.g. sedan, hatchback, SUV)

The eight digit: Engine type (specifically engine size and horsepower)

Position 9: the VIN check digit

The ninth digit is a unique “check digit” based on the other numbers in the VIN and is used to prevent fake VINS.

Why it matters: It would be easy to generate a fake VIN since most of the other Kia VIN number and letter positions are standardized and can be found online. The 9th digit helps prevent fraud and verify the unique VIN code for your specific Kia.

Position 10: model year

As the years go by, the system for referencing model years gets more complicated. We are seeing more VINs re-use digits that already refer to earlier Kia models.

Here’s a breakdown of the Kia VIN model year codes over the last 20 years:

Code	Year
1	2001
2	2002
3	2003
4	2004
5	2005
6	2006
7	2007
8	2008
9	2009
A	2010
B	1981 OR 2011
C	1982 OR 2012
D	1983 OR 2013
E	1984 OR 2014
F	1985 OR 2015
G	1986 OR 2016
H	1987 OR 2017
J	1988 OR 2018
K	1989 OR 2019
L	1990 OR 2020
M	1991 OR 2021

Position 11: assembly plant

The eleventh digit refers to the specific assembly plant of your Kia. Kia has plants in the following locations:

Korea: Four plants

Slovakia: One plant

Georgia: One plant

Positions 12-17: vehicle serial number

The final six digits of a VIN represent the specific car’s serial number. This number is unique to your Kia and is generally assigned while in assembly.

Want more info? Try typing your VIN into a Kia VIN decoder to get specific information about your vehicle.

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