VehicleScore research
CAT S and CAT N in VehicleScore’s write-off records
Among 11,156 vehicles with a CAT marker in VehicleScore paid checks, 48.7% had a CAT N record and 45.1% had a CAT S record. Those are 5,433 and 5,034 vehicles. The shares can overlap, because one vehicle can have carried more than one category.
What GOV.UK says the current letters mean
GOV.UK’s insurance write-off guidance sets out four categories. Category A cannot be repaired and the entire vehicle has to be crushed. Category B cannot be repaired; the body shell has to be crushed, and other parts can be salvaged. Category N can be repaired following non-structural damage and used again if it is repaired to a roadworthy condition. Category S can be repaired following structural damage, on the same roadworthy condition.
GOV.UK says an insurer decides whether a vehicle is a write-off, and pays the current value instead of the repair cost. For category S, DVLA records the category in the log book. For category N, GOV.UK says you can keep the log book if you keep the vehicle. This page is not advice on a particular car.
CAT C and CAT D still appear on older records in this dataset: 382 vehicles with a CAT C marker and 751 with CAT D. GOV.UK’s current table does not define those two letters. They are historic labels in the file, not a fifth and sixth current category. CAT A and CAT B are rare here: 8 and 41 vehicles.
Share of CAT-marked vehicles carrying each category
Salvage history is not the same list
A salvage flag in this dataset means a salvage-auction record was returned. A CAT marker means an insurance category was returned. They meet often. They are not the same signal.
5,128 vehicles had both a CAT marker and a salvage flag. 6,027 had a CAT marker and no salvage flag. 1,626 had a salvage flag and no CAT marker. One further vehicle had a CAT marker and an unknown salvage result.
The salvage denominator is different from the write-off denominator. 7,079 of 83,712 vehicles with a known salvage flag had that flag, 8.5% (Wilson 95% interval 8.3%–8.7%). You cannot subtract the CAT rate from the salvage rate and call the difference anything. The populations are not the same 82,073 vehicles.
The practical consequence for a buyer is ordinary. A history check can return a category, a salvage record, both, or neither. “No category” does not mean “no salvage record”, and the reverse is also true. The age pattern and the model examples are on insurance write-offs.
One registration, not the category average
CAT S against CAT N is a description of damage class, on GOV.UK’s terms, plus the mix we observed. Neither tells you the category on the car you are buying. The free check identifies the vehicle. The category, if one was returned, is in Hidden History.
Related VehicleScore research
Methodology
Snapshot 27 September 2026, job 2026-09-27.1. Latest paid report per registration. Category shares use the 11,156 vehicles with at least one marker as the denominator. Because categories overlap, do not add the shares to 100 and treat the remainder as a missing category. The overlap counts are vehicles, not category rows.
Definitions of A, B, N and S are taken from GOV.UK, linked above, and are not rewritten here as legal advice. The rates describe vehicles checked through VehicleScore.