Warrant of Fitness checklist: pass first time
Most WOF failures are small, visible things you can catch in the driveway the week before. Ten minutes with this list is the cheapest recheck you will ever avoid.
Every light and indicator
Walk around with a helper (or a reflection in a window): headlights on both beams, brake lights, indicators, fog lights, number-plate bulbs. Bulbs are the single biggest failure category and the cheapest fix on this page.
Tyres: tread, pressure, damage
At least 1.5mm of tread in every principal groove that carries a moulded wear indicator, all the way round the tyre, and 4mm if they are winter tyres. No cuts, bulges or cords showing, and pressures set to the plate on the door pillar.
Wipers, washers, screen
Wipers that clear without smearing, washer jets that actually spray, and no chips or cracks in the driver’s sweep area big enough to obstruct view. Top the washer fluid: an empty bottle is a fail.
Horn, seatbelts, mirrors
A working horn, seatbelts that latch and retract on every seat, and the required mirrors present, secure and intact. Thirty seconds to check, all testable items.
Warning lights on the dash
Airbag, ABS and brake warning lights that stay lit are failures in their own right, so get one diagnosed before the test rather than explained to the inspector. An engine management light on its own is not a WOF failure in New Zealand, though it is still telling you something worth looking at. From 1 November 2026 the inspection also checks that no warning light is showing for automatic emergency braking or lane keep assist, on cars that have them.
Listen and feel on one short drive
Knocks over bumps, grinding when braking, a pull to one side: the tyre and brake defects that dominate the dangerous end of the list rarely arrive silently. A week of margin turns them from a fail into an appointment.
Why cars actually fail
Year after year the same categories top the WOF failure lists: lights and signalling, tyres, brakes, and steering and suspension. Almost all of it is visible or audible before you hand the keys over. That matters more from 1 November 2026, when the WOF schedule changes: the six-monthly WOF is scrapped, new cars get their second WOF at four years instead of three, most cars aged four to fourteen move to a WOF every two years, and cars over 26 years old move from six-monthly to annual. Longer gaps between inspections put more of the checking back on you.
Get the WOF done in the last 14 days before the current one expires and the new one runs from the old expiry date, so you lose no days. Go earlier than that and the new expiry is counted from 14 days after the inspection, so testing a month ahead quietly costs you the difference.
Common questions
How long does a WOF take?
Usually about half an hour to an hour. If a small fix and a recheck are needed, plan for the workshop having the car for longer.
Can I drive if my WOF has expired?
Only if you are driving it solely to bring it back into compliance, which means to an inspection or to a repairer, and only if the car is safe to drive there. There is no pre-booking condition in New Zealand and no grace period. Anything else is a $200 infringement fee, rising to $350 from 1 November 2026 once the WOF has been expired more than two months. The same rule bites the moment the car fails, so a failed car is off the road even if the old WOF still has time left on it. An expired WOF does not automatically void your insurance, but if a fault the WOF would have caught contributed to the crash, the insurer can decline the claim.
What happens if my car fails?
You get a check sheet listing what failed. Fix those items and return within 28 days of the failed inspection to the same inspecting organisation, any branch of it, and the recheck is free. Miss the 28 days, or take the car somewhere else, and you pay for a full inspection again.
Should I service the car before or after the WOF?
Booking them together in one visit is usually cheapest and catches service items that would fail the test anyway. If choosing one order: test first, then let the service fix what it found.
Something on the list needs fixing first?
Book the work with a trusted local garage, or describe the fault and vetted mechanics quote you direct.
Book with a local garageWhat happens if it fails
A fail is not the end of the day, and knowing how the retest works saves both money and a wasted trip.
In New Zealand you do not have to ask, because the rules are fixed. Fix the listed items and return within 28 days of the failed inspection to the same inspecting organisation and the recheck costs nothing, and any branch of that organisation counts. Leave it longer than 28 days, or take the car elsewhere, and it is a full inspection and a full fee again.
You are never obliged to have the failing work done where the test happened. Getting a second quote is reasonable and often worthwhile, particularly on the larger items. What matters is that the work is done properly and the car is retested in time.
The things the inspector mentions but does not fail you on
A WOF pass is a pass. New Zealand has no advisory list on the certificate the way some countries do, so what you get instead is a quiet word at the counter, and it is worth more attention than it usually gets.
It is the inspector saying an item is legal today and heading towards not being. Tyres near the limit, a shock absorber starting to weep, corrosion that is not yet structural. None of it fails the car, and all of it is a forecast.
Read it as a budget rather than a scolding. Being told your tread is getting close tells you roughly when you will be buying tyres, which is more useful than finding out at the next inspection with no time to shop around.
Because none of it is recorded anywhere a future buyer can look it up, keeping track is on you. Write it down when you get home, or it is gone by the time the car is next on a hoist.
One practical habit: photograph the check sheet when you get it. It is easier to find on a phone than in a drawer a year later, and it means you can see what was flagged before you book the next one rather than turning up and hoping nothing has grown.