Successfully Importing Your Car to France: A Step-by-Step Guide for Expats

As you plan your move to France, bringing your own car can feel like the obvious choice: it is familiar, it is paid for, and it will be waiting for you on arrival. The honest picture is more mixed. Importing and registering a foreign vehicle in France is entirely doable, but the costs and paperwork differ enormously depending on where the car comes from and whether it was built for the European market. This guide walks through the real process, including the parts that decide whether importing is worth it at all.

1. Customs: duty, VAT and the moving exemption

What you pay at the border depends on where the car is coming from.

• From outside the EU (which now includes both the US and the UK): the default is 10% customs duty plus 20% French VAT, calculated on the car’s value plus shipping. Classic cars over 30 years old get preferential treatment: no duty and a reduced 5.5% VAT.
• From another EU country: no duty, and generally no French VAT on a used car (a “new” vehicle, under six months old or under 6,000 km, is the exception).

The good news for people actually moving here is the transfer-of-residence exemption: if you have lived outside the EU for at least the past 12 months, owned and used the car for at least six months before the move, and import it within 12 months of taking up residence, you can bring it in free of duty and VAT. The condition is that you keep it: no selling, lending or hiring it out for 12 months after import.

Either way, customs clearance produces the document the whole process hinges on: the certificat 846A for a non-EU import (or a quitus fiscal from the tax office for an EU-sourced car). Registration is impossible without it, so keep it safe.

2. Conformity: the step that catches American cars

Before France will register a vehicle, it must be shown to conform to European standards.

• EU-market cars come with (or can obtain) a Certificate of Conformity (COC) from the manufacturer, which settles the question.
• US-specification cars have no COC. They must go through individual homologation (Réception à Titre Isolé) via the DREAL, often involving laboratory testing, modifications and fees that commonly run into thousands of euros, and for some models it is not practically achievable at all. This, more than shipping costs, is why many advisers tell American movers to sell at home and buy in France. It deserves a hard look before you book a container.
• UK cars are EU-built in regulatory terms, so a COC is usually obtainable; the main physical change is adapting the headlights for right-hand traffic.

3. Inspections, taxes and insurance

• Contrôle technique: a car more than four years old needs a French roadworthiness test less than six months old when you apply to register it. After that, it is the standard cycle: first test at four years, then every two years.
• Registration taxes: the carte grise fee is based on fiscal horsepower and region, but the number to check before importing is the malus écologique: since 2025 France applies its CO2 and weight-based penalty taxes to imported used cars too (with an age-based reduction), and on a large-engined American SUV this can run to thousands of euros on its own.
• Crit’Air: once registered, order the small Crit’Air air-quality sticker online; it is required in the low-emission zones that now cover most large French cities, and older diesels face real restrictions there.
• Insurance: third-party liability (responsabilité civile) is the legal minimum, with comprehensive (tous risques) the sensible choice for a car you have just shipped across an ocean. One update from recent years: the green card (carte verte) was abolished in 2024; insurance is now checked electronically against the insurance register, and your insurer simply issues a memo document for your records.

4. Registering with ANTS

Registration itself is done online through the ANTS portal within one month of the vehicle arriving in France. You will upload the customs certificate (846A or quitus fiscal), proof of conformity (COC or RTI approval), the contrôle technique report, proof of identity and address, and pay the fees. While the file is processed you receive a provisional registration certificate so the car can be driven legally, and the definitive carte grise follows by post.

So, should you bring it?

For an EU or UK car you own outright and love, the process is paperwork-heavy but reasonable. For a US-specification car, add up the honest total: shipping, 10% duty and 20% VAT unless the moving exemption applies, homologation running potentially into thousands, possible malus in the thousands more, and a market where your left-hand-drive American model may be worth less than it was at home. Sometimes the answer is still yes, especially for exempt moves with European-market vehicles; often it is to sell and rebuy.

Drive with confidence, supported by French Connections HCB

Vehicle importation is one of those projects where a single missing document stalls everything for months. French Connections HCB handles vehicle registration and importation as part of our administration support: we can assess your specific car before you ship it, tell you what it will really cost, and then run the customs and ANTS process end to end. If you are weighing up whether to bring your car, book a consultation and we will help you decide with real numbers.