Registration atlas
Getting a new trailer registered
Every country below has a different answer, and the difference that matters is when the requirement has to be met. We read each one from the responsible authority, date it, and check your configuration against it before we quote.
CE marking and road approval
A CE mark is not road-vehicle approval. CE marking applies to products inside specific harmonised EU product legislation. Road trailers are approved under Regulation (EU) 2018/858, a separate framework with separate evidence. The difference, explained.
By country
Documented routes
Netherlands
The RDW individually approves a trailer brought in from outside the EU, and publishes a public checklist. The requirement binds selling as well as driving: a un…
Read the routeGermany
Germany imposes no pre-shipment, pre-import or border approval requirement. The control point is after arrival, and the bar falls on the sale rather than on the…
Read the routeUnited Kingdom
Great Britain has no pre-shipment approval and no border admissibility bar. The requirement falls at the point of supply: supplying a new category O trailer for…
Read the routeAustralia
Australia requires import approval before the unit is shipped, entry on the Register of Approved Vehicles before it is supplied, and separately certified gas an…
Read the routeUnited States
Both a federal pre-import requirement and a state selling-side requirement apply. A US-resident agent for service of process must be designated with NHTSA befor…
Read the routeCanada
A new non-CMVSS-compliant trailer under fifteen years old is not eligible for permanent import, and there is no provision to modify a non-compliant vehicle into…
Read the routeNew Zealand
New Zealand's vehicle approval is light. A trailer under 3,500 kg needs no entry certification, no type approval, no Certificate of Conformity and no VIN. The r…
Read the routeFrance
Homologation is a prerequisite to registration. Imported or modified vehicles use individual or isolated reception through DREAL, DRIEAT, DEAL or DGTM.…
Read the routeEquipment
The requirement that is not about the trailer
A trailer can pass vehicle approval and still be unsaleable because the cooker inside it is not certified for that market. LPG cooking equipment built for other markets does not normally hold the certificates these markets require.
Gas and electrical equipment carry their own approval regimes, separate from vehicle approval and separate from food hygiene. In several markets the certification must exist at the time of manufacture and cannot be added afterwards, which makes it a bill-of-materials constraint rather than a paperwork step.
The specification decides the market as much as the market decides the specification. This is why equipment for a unit going to Australia or New Zealand is selected differently from the start, and why we ask where it is going before we ask what it will cook.
| Requirement | Market | Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| It is an offence in every Australian state and territory to sell or offer a Type A gas appliance not certified by an authorised Conformity Assessment Body. Certification must be established at the time of manufacture. CE and CSA certification are explicitly not sufficient and the appliance cannot be retro-certified. | AU | verified |
| Under the Electrical Equipment Safety System the first importer is the Responsible Supplier and must be an Australian or New Zealand legal entity holding an ABN or NZ IRD number. An overseas company cannot register. | AU | verified |
| Gas appliances and specified fittings must be certified by a recognised certification body before they can be offered for sale. The importer must make a Supplier Declaration of Compliance, register on WorkSafe's gas SDoC database and attach the flame-logo compliance label. LPG appliances need Universal LP gas certification; propane-only is not accepted. The amended Gas (Safety and Measurement) Regulations 2010 took effect 13 November 2025 with transition to 13 November 2026. | NZ | verified |
| Electricity (Safety) Regulations 2010 reg 76 bars connecting a connectable installation in a vehicle to a supply without a current Warrant of Electrical Fitness, issued to AS/NZS 3001.2 by an authorised person inside New Zealand. | NZ | verified |
| An onboard generator is a nonroad engine. EPA Form 3520-21 must be filed with CBP for every imported nonroad engine including engines incorporated into equipment, and admission requires a valid EPA certificate of conformity and an English emission control label. | US | verified |
| Gas appliances follow their own conformity route under Regulation (EU) 2016/426, separate from both vehicle approval and CE marking of other components. | EU | verified |
EU baseline
What applies across the Union
Categories. Regulation (EU) 2018/858 covers category O road trailers. O1 up to 0.75 t, O2 over 0.75 t to 3.5 t, O3 over 3.5 t to 10 t, O4 over 10 t. It provides whole-vehicle type approval, EU individual approval and national individual approval routes.
Type approval and CoC. EU type approval lets an approval obtained in one member state support EU-wide marketing without further tests, subject to conformity. A Certificate of Conformity is tied to the approved vehicle type.
VIN and WMI. EU vehicle rules require a structured VIN and World Manufacturer Identifier with statutory identification and traceability. A supplier printing a VIN on a plate is not evidence that a WMI was authorised to them.
The CE boundary. CE marking applies to products inside specific harmonised EU product legislation. It is not blanket road approval and it is not a government safety certificate. Gas appliances have their own conformity route under Regulation (EU) 2016/426.
Food operation is separate. Regulation (EC) 852/2004 separately requires hygienic premises and equipment, handwashing, potable water, waste control, cleanable food-contact surfaces, temperature control and HACCP-based procedures. A road-legal trailer is not automatically an approved mobile food business.
Using this
It is free, and attribution is the only ask
Every route on these pages names the regulator's own source and the date it was read. Quote it, reproduce a row, or set it as reading. If a row is wrong, tell us. Corrections are dated and published on the corrections page rather than edited away quietly.
The route for a given unit is on the approval route finder. What changed and when it took effect is on the change log. The rows behind both are published as open data.
What every route was read from
The documents, and the date each was opened
Each route below was read from the document named beside it, on the date beside it. 8 countries, and where a source is a regulator's guidance page rather than the instrument itself, that is what the row says.