In Germany the first letters (one, two or three) are fixed for the town or county, but you can choose the following letters (one or two) and ciphers (one, two, three or four). But the letters must come first and then the ciphers.

I think, that, since the new style of plates came out (then some more letters were possible), around 60 to 70% of the cars here, have vanity combinations. It costs around 12 to 15 Euro.

It's usually hard to get short combinations, like B-A 1 or M-X 5 or so. They are reserved for motorbikes and US-cars, where a European plate doesn't fit. Surely, good relations to the boss of the car-registration-authority helps, too.


I've seen, that owners of classic cars have often car-related vanity combinations, owners of other cars usually personal one, initials and birthday mostly.
There are exceptions: for example Porsche-owners. The most Porsche-plates over here have the numbers 911, 968, 924, 944 and so on.
And I saw several Citroens with XM or BX.

In Dortmund one plate-combination was becoming popular by a movie:
http://imcdb.org/vehicle_105927-Ford-Taunus-TC1-1974.html
But as I wrote, the holder in reality will not give it away.