Enter the 17-character VIN of your Alpina to see the factory basics. Free, with no registration.
Look on the dashboard, the driver's door frame or in the registration document.
Type all 17 characters. The letters I, O and Q are never used in a VIN.
See the factory basics for free, and order a full report for the history behind the VIN.
Enter a 17-character Alpina VIN and the decoder reads the manufacturer, the model year and the country of manufacture straight from the code. Our data lists 22 Alpina models, from the B3, B5 and B7 to the D5, the XB7 and the Roadster V8, with model years from 1978 to the present.
The decoder is free and needs no registration, but it only reads the VIN itself. Accidents, mileage, theft records and previous owners are not stored in the number, and that information comes from a paid vehicle history report.
Every VIN has 17 characters, and the letters I, O and Q are never used. The first three characters are the World Manufacturer Identifier. For Alpina we map the code WAP, which belongs to Germany. If your VIN starts with WAP, the decoder will name the manufacturer and the country of manufacture. Our list of codes is not complete, so it only tells you which codes we recognise for the brand.
Characters 4 to 8 form the descriptor section, and character 9 is a check digit. North America requires it, while many European VINs fill that position differently, so we do not treat it as a test. Character 10 is the model year, character 11 the plant, and characters 12 to 17 the serial number.
Take the tenth character as an example. A J there means model year 2018, an L means 2020, and an S means 2025, all inside the range our Alpina data covers. Standardised 17-character VINs apply to cars built since 1981, so an Alpina from the earliest years in our data, 1978 to 1980, may not carry a VIN in this format.
Every VIN has six parts. This is what each of them means.
| Part | Characters | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| WMI | 1 to 3 | World manufacturer identifier: who built the vehicle and where |
| VDS | 4 to 8 | Vehicle descriptor: model, body type and engine, as set by the manufacturer |
| Check digit | 9 | Control value that helps confirm the VIN is valid |
| Model year | 10 | Code for the model year |
| Plant | 11 | Code for the assembly plant |
| Serial | 12 to 17 | Production sequence number of this vehicle |
On the driver's side, visible through the windshield.
On a sticker on the door frame or the edge of the door.
Printed in the vehicle registration or title.
Stamped on the firewall or the frame on many models.
A VIN is built from six parts, and each one says something about the vehicle. Our guides explain how to read it and what it can and cannot tell you.
Enter the 17-character VIN and see the factory basics in seconds.
Look at the base of the windscreen on the driver's side, on the door pillar and in the registration papers. Check that the number is the same in each place.
The first three characters are the manufacturer code. We recognise WAP for Alpina, and it belongs to Germany. Other characters in the first three positions are not a sign of a problem, since our list of codes is not complete.
Read the tenth character. For example, K stands for 2019, M for 2021 and R for 2024. The decoder does this for you and shows the year in the result.
It cannot show accidents, mileage, theft status or previous owners, because none of that is part of the VIN. It also does not tell you the condition of a particular car.
Compare the VIN on the car with the one in the documents and make sure the decoded year and country fit what the seller tells you. Then ask for service records and have the car inspected, since the VIN says nothing about its condition.