How US States Define a Kei Truck: Three Templates, One of Which Excludes Most Imports

Disclosure: this page contains referral links, marked where they appear. Measurements are taken from manufacturers’ own published specifications and from statutes, both cited.

American states that allow kei trucks on the road have to define them first, and they did not coordinate. Reading the statutes side by side turns up something that matters to owners and to anyone drafting a bill:

Looking for whether your own state allows them at all? That question is answered state by state in the 50-state guide, which has the current position everywhere with statute and bill numbers. This page is about something narrower: how the states that do allow them write the definition, and why one of those definitions excludes most of the trucks you can actually import.

Two states and one pending bill define a kei truck as 130 inches long or less — Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Massachusetts’ H.4053. 130 inches is 3,302 mm, and Japan’s kei length limit was 3,300 mm from 1990 until October 1998, when it went to 3,400 mm. Every kei truck built from 1999 onward measures 3,395 mm, or 133.7 inches.

Those figures are each independently verifiable and are sourced below. What connects them is not: no drafting record I have found states that these legislatures took 130 inches from Japan’s pre-1998 standard, and this page does not claim one does. The correspondence is close enough to be worth showing, and the practical effect on an owner is the same either way, but treat the explanation as an inference and the measurements as the fact.

On the face of those statutes, the trucks Americans are importing today are between three and four inches too long to be the vehicle the law describes. And because the federal 25-year rule keeps advancing into the post-1998 generation, the share of the importable market that falls outside those definitions grows every year.

I research Japan’s used vehicle market from Sapporo. What follows is the comparison, with the statutes and the manufacturers’ own figures cited so you can check every number.

Five Templates

States have arrived at five distinct approaches. The differences are not cosmetic — they determine which vehicles qualify.

	“Kei Jidosha” template	Indiana	Ohio	Nebraska	Colorado
Used by	Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Massachusetts’ pending bill H.4053	Indiana	Ohio	Nebraska	Colorado (from 2028)
Engine	660cc or less	Not less than 660cc	660cc or less (or 7,500 W electric)	1,500cc or less	1,000cc or less (or 56,000 W electric)
Overall length	130 in or less	No limit	No limit	No limit	140 in or less
Overall width	60 in or less	60 in or less	No limit	67 in or less	67 in or less
Overall height	78 in or less	No limit	No limit	No limit	No limit
Weight	No limit	Unladen dry weight 1,600 lb or less	Total dry weight 900 to 2,200 lb	Dry weight 4,200 lb or less	No limit
Speed	No limit in the definition	Top speed not more than 60 mph	No limit in the definition	Top speed of approximately 55 mph	🔑 Top speed of at least 50 mph
FMVSS	Not addressed	Not addressed	Must NOT have been built to FMVSS	Not addressed	Refusal on design grounds statutorily barred
Fits a 1999+ kei truck?	No — 3.7 in too long	Partly — see the weight discussion	Yes, comfortably	Yes, comfortably	Yes, by design

Sources: PennDOT’s Mini Trucks FAQ; N.C.G.S. § 20-4.01; Massachusetts H.4053; Indiana BMV; ORC 4501.01; Neb. Rev. Stat. § 60-636.01; Colorado HB25-1281 (C.R.S. 42-1-102(45.3)).

What the Trucks Actually Measure

The comparison only works if the vehicle figures are right, so these come from the makers where the makers still publish them.

Generation	Overall length	In inches	Kerb weight
Honda Acty HA3/HA4 (1990–1999)	3,255 mm	128.1 in	—
Suzuki Carry DD51T (1991–1999)	3,295 mm	129.7 in	650–790 kg (1,433–1,742 lb)
Hijet, Sambar, Minicab (to 1999)	3,295 mm	129.7 in	—
Suzuki Carry DA52T/DB52T (from Jan 1999)	3,395 mm	133.7 in	670–740 kg (1,477–1,631 lb)
Honda Acty HA6/HA7 (1999–2009)	3,395 mm	133.7 in	800–850 kg (1,764–1,874 lb)
Daihatsu Hijet, Subaru Sambar, Mitsubishi Minicab, 1999 onward	3,395 mm (catalogue databases, not maker archives)	133.7 in	—

The Carry figures are from Suzuki’s own digital spec library (January 1999 model) and the adjacent 1991 sheet in the same archive. The HA6/HA7 Acty figures are from Honda’s own model archive. The pre-1999 lengths for Daihatsu, Subaru and Mitsubishi come from Japanese used-vehicle catalogue databases, cross-checked across multiple grades rather than a single page, because those makers no longer publish 1990s specifications.

The pattern is not a coincidence. Every maker moved to 3,395 mm at the same time, because the class limit moved — a maker still building to 3,300 mm after October 1998 would have been leaving 95 mm of free length on the table in a class defined by how little of it you get.

A note on how firmly each row is established. Suzuki and Honda still publish their 1990s specification archives, so those two figures come from the manufacturers themselves. Daihatsu, Subaru and Mitsubishi no longer publish specifications from that period, so those three come from cross-checked Japanese catalogue databases instead. I have found no contradicting figure and the regulatory logic makes an exception implausible, but the evidence behind those three rows is a step weaker than behind the first two, and the table now says so.

Why 1998 Is the Line

Japan’s kei class allowed a maximum length of 3.30 m from 1990. In October 1998 the standard was enlarged to 3.40 m long and 1.48 m wide, and every manufacturer redesigned to the new envelope within months.

The reason matters here. The published Japanese industry history gives the aims of the 1998 enlargement as emissions, occupant comfort and crash safety — the extra 100 mm of length bought crush structure ahead of the cabin. Kei vehicles built before that revision were designed to an older collision standard.

Which produces an awkward result when you read it against how American agencies talk about these vehicles. PennDOT’s stated objection to mini trucks, given to the Altoona Mirror when Pennsylvania’s reform bill was introduced, is that “mini trucks manufactured prior to 1998 were not subject to crash testing.”

So the 130-inch definition fits the pre-1998 trucks the agency describes as untested, and excludes the post-1998 trucks built after Japan lengthened the class for safety. Whether the 130-inch figure was borrowed from the old Japanese standard deliberately or arrived there by coincidence, I cannot establish — the number appears in these documents without an explanation attached.

Oregon Made the Same Mistake in Feet

One more data point, and it is the sharpest one, because it happened in a bill written specifically to help. Oregon’s HB 4063, introduced in January 2026, would have let owners title and register a kei truck. It defined one as, among other things, “11 feet or less in length.”

Eleven feet is 132 inches. A kei truck built from 1999 is 133.7. The bill drafted to legalise these vehicles would have excluded most of the ones people actually import, by 1.7 inches — closer than the 130-inch states, and still on the wrong side.

It died in committee on February 16, 2026 by missing the policy deadline, so the defect was never tested. It was the second Oregon attempt to fail. If it returns, changing “11 feet” to “12 feet” is the whole fix.

The Problem Compounds Every Year

This is the part that turns a drafting curiosity into something worth acting on.

Be precise about the mechanism, because it is easy to state loosely. The 25-year rule never takes eligibility away — a 1997 truck stays importable forever. What changes is the mix. Each year the rule admits one more model year at the newer end, while the surviving stock of pre-1999 trucks in Japan keeps shrinking through ordinary attrition. In 2026 the eligible pool is trucks built roughly 25 years ago or earlier — the rule runs to the month of manufacture rather than the calendar year, so by late 2026 that means most of 2001: some pre-1999 examples that fit a 130-inch definition, and 1999–2001 examples that do not. The pre-1999 share of that pool falls every year from both directions at once.

By the early 2030s, essentially the entire importable kei truck market will be post-1998. A statute written around a 1990 Japanese standard will describe almost nothing that can be bought.

Indiana’s Different Constraint

Indiana has its own page here — every road but the interstate, if it weighs little enough — and the weight arithmetic is worked through in full there.

Indiana avoided the length trap entirely — its definition has no length limit, and it inverts the engine figure, requiring displacement of not less than 660cc. That is a sensible piece of drafting: the floor keeps golf carts and small utility vehicles out of the class rather than keeping kei trucks out of it, and 660cc is exactly what a kei truck has.

Indiana instead caps unladen dry weight at 1,600 pounds, and that is where a buyer should look carefully. On the Japanese kerb-weight figures above, a light 2WD Carry at 670 kg is 1,477 lb and comfortably inside; a heavier variant at 740 kg is 1,631 lb and outside; and every HA6/HA7 Acty at 800–850 kg is 1,764–1,874 lb, well outside.

One honest caveat, because it cuts in the buyer’s favour and I am not going to hide it: Japanese specification sheets publish 車両重量, a kerb weight that includes coolant, oil and a full fuel tank. Indiana’s term is “unladen dry weight,” which conventionally excludes fluids. The Japanese figure is therefore the higher of the two measures, and some trucks that look over the line on kerb weight may clear it on a dry figure. I cannot tell you where a specific truck lands, and neither can anyone who has not weighed it. If you are buying for Indiana and looking at a heavier variant, that is a question for the BMV before money moves.

Ohio and Minnesota Built the Non-Compliance Into the Definition

This template goes at the problem from the opposite end. ORC 4501.01 requires that a mini-truck “was not originally manufactured to meet federal motor vehicle safety standards” — and Minn. Stat. § 169.011 subd. 40a uses nearly identical wording, with the same 900–2,200 lb weight band and the same “resembles a pickup truck or van” test. Ohio and Minnesota share a template.

The fact that New York and Georgia use to refuse these vehicles is, in these two states, a condition of membership in the class. Neither sets a length or width limit. Both give a total dry weight band of 900 to 2,200 pounds — the lower bound excluding golf carts, the upper bound comfortably above any kei truck — and both add the functional test that the vehicle “resembles a pickup truck or van.”

On drafting, both are as good as Nebraska. Where both fall down is the operating rule rather than the definition: Ohio requires a local ordinance and caps road use at 35 mph, and Minnesota requires a local ordinance and an individual permit, with a sheriff’s inspection and annual renewal. A state can get the definition exactly right and still leave owners queueing at a county counter.

Nebraska Wrote the Definition Everyone Should Copy

Nebraska also has its own page: the state that wrote the definition right, including the two-sentence operating statute and the $10 titling process.

Nebraska’s statute is the outlier, and it is the outlier in the right direction. Neb. Rev. Stat. § 60-636.01 defines a minitruck as a “foreign-manufactured import vehicle or domestic-manufactured vehicle” with:

• engine displacement of 1,500 cubic centimetres or less
• 67 inches or less in width
• dry weight of 4,200 pounds or less
• four or more tires
• a top speed of approximately 55 miles per hour
• a bed or compartment for hauling and an enclosed passenger cab
• headlights, taillights, turn signals, windshield wipers, a rearview mirror and an occupant protection system
• a four-speed, five-speed or automatic transmission

Two things stand out. First, no length limit at all, and every other figure has real headroom: 1,500cc against a 660cc engine, 67 inches against 58.1 inches of width, 4,200 pounds against roughly 1,600–1,900. Second, the definition says “foreign-manufactured import vehicle” in its own text. Nebraska wrote the class knowing exactly what it was describing, and defined it by function — a small enclosed cab-over truck with a bed, capable of about 55 mph — rather than by copying a foreign regulatory envelope.

A functional definition does not go stale when another country changes its rules. That is the whole lesson.

To apply the same standard I applied to Ohio, though: a good definition is not the same as good access. Nebraska bars minitrucks from the interstate system, expressways and freeways, so its owners are not free to drive anywhere either — they simply lose three road classes instead of being confined to one. That is a far better bargain than Ohio’s, and it is still a bargain rather than a blank cheque.

Colorado Wrote the One to Copy

One state went further than all of them, and it did it after this problem was visible. Colorado’s HB25-1281, signed May 9, 2025, defines a kei vehicle at 140 inches or less in length — six inches of headroom over the trucks people actually import, where the other length-limit states left three and a half inches of deficit.

It also does something no other definition does: it requires “A TOP SPEED OF AT LEAST FIFTY MILES PER HOUR.” A floor, not a ceiling. That excludes golf carts and side-by-sides by capability rather than by measurement, and it treats the vehicle as belonging in traffic rather than beside it.

And Colorado did not stop at the definition. The bill folds kei vehicles into the general definition of “motor vehicle” for both traffic law and auto insurance; specifies a two-speed idle emissions test instead of a dynamometer cycle, judged against the standards for the model year the vehicle was built; bars the Department of Revenue and the State Patrol from requiring an inspection because a vehicle is a kei vehicle; provides that a kei vehicle may not be declared unroadworthy “BASED ON ITS DESIGN OR MANUFACTURING PARAMETERS”; and shields licensed dealers from liability for selling one that was not built to US federal safety standards.

Read the list again and notice what it is: a point-by-point answer to every reason other states give for saying no. It passed the Colorado House 64–1 and the Senate 35–0. The catch is the timetable — the act takes effect July 1, 2027 and applies to applications from January 1, 2028 — so Colorado is the best law in the country and the longest wait in the country at the same time.

If you are lobbying a legislature, this is the bill to hand over. Nebraska’s definition is the cleanest short one; Colorado’s is the complete one.

The Other Trap: Borrowed Classes

The length limit is the problem you can measure. There is a second one that is easier to miss, and I have now hit it in three states in a row.

Guides commonly report a state as “allowed” because a kei truck can register under some existing class — a low-speed vehicle, an all-terrain vehicle, a street-legal ATV. The road restrictions attached to that class get quoted widely. The entry requirements do not. And those classes were written for American vehicle types, so they carry conditions an imported Japanese road vehicle cannot meet:

• Virginia — low-speed vehicle. The class caps the vehicle’s own top speed at 25 mph, and DMV’s licensing guide requires the ownership documents to show conformity with 49 C.F.R. Part 571.500 — failing which, “only the manufacturer is eligible to provide this confirmation.” No Japanese maker will certify a kei truck against the American low-speed vehicle standard.
• Oregon — Class IV all-terrain vehicle. The DMV’s own page offers this route, but a 2023 amendment added a requirement that the vehicle “was originally manufactured for off-road use only.” A kei truck was manufactured for roads.
• Utah — street-legal ATV. Every guide quotes the 50 mph limit from this framework, but Utah’s ATV definitions require low-pressure tyres, a rollover protection system, or a design “primarily for recreational use on unimproved terrain.” A kei truck has none of the three.
• Washington — low-speed vehicle. Every low-speed class in Washington statute is electrically powered; the medium-speed class adds a roll cage and 49 C.F.R. 571.500; and the wheeled all-terrain vehicle class requires handlebars and a width of 50 inches or less. A petrol kei truck fails on power source alone.

In each case the quoted answer describes the ceiling of a class the truck may never have entered. The lesson generalises: when a source tells you a state allows kei trucks under class X, read what class X requires on the way in, not just what it permits once you are there. Four of the four states I checked this way did not survive it, and a fifth — Maryland — produced the opposite surprise: its published instructions are more permissive than its reputation.

The mechanism is the same every time. The road restriction attached to a class — 35 mph, 50 mph, no interstates — is short and quotable and travels well. The entry requirement is a technical definition several sections away, and does not travel at all.

Colorado’s Template Is Already Spreading

The encouraging counterpart. When Virginia’s delegates drafted HB 219 in 2026, they did not reach for the 130-inch language or try to squeeze these trucks into the low-speed vehicle class. They copied Colorado:

	Colorado HB25-1281 (enacted)	Virginia HB 219 (introduced)
Length	140 in or less	140 in or less
Width	67 in or less	67 in or less
Engine	1,000cc / 56,000 W	1,000cc / 56,000 W
Speed	At least 50 mph	At least 55 mph
Import status named	Yes	Yes
Dealer liability shield	Yes	Yes

Two model templates are now circulating in American legislatures — the 130-inch one that excludes the vehicle, and Colorado’s, which does not. That is worth knowing if you are the person handing a draft to a legislator, because the choice has already been made twice and you can point at both outcomes.

One caution on the copy: Virginia raised the speed floor from 50 to 55. Measured kei truck top speeds run roughly 50 to 58 mph, so 55 straddles the fleet where 50 does not. If you are lobbying in a state considering this template, ask for 50.

What This Means If You Own One

• Separate the drafting defect from your actual risk today. These are two different things and I do not want to conflate them. The defect is real and on the page of the statute. The enforcement risk appears to be low: these trucks are in fact registered in North Carolina, so the length figure is evidently not applied with a tape measure at the counter. What the defect creates is uncertainty you cannot price — a future clerk, a future audit or a future amendment could read the statute as written. A five-minute written enquiry to your own office removes that uncertainty for the cost of an email, which is why it is worth doing even though nobody has been refused over three and a half inches.
• A pre-1999 truck sidesteps it entirely, and the older generation is cheaper in Japan anyway. If you want certainty in Pennsylvania or North Carolina, filter for pre-1999 builds.
• This is not a loophole to exploit in the other direction. Being outside a mini truck definition does not make a vehicle a federally certified car; it makes it a vehicle with no state pathway at all. Arguing millimetres at a service counter is not a plan.
• If you are writing to a legislator, ask for one number — and cite Colorado. Changing 130 to 140 inches is not a hypothetical fix: Colorado already wrote 140, in a bill that passed 64–1 and 35–0. In Massachusetts that request is live right now: H.4053 has been sitting in House Ways and Means since July 28, 2025, which is exactly where amendments happen.

State Guides

Each of these states has its own page here, with the statute quoted and the practical process set out:

• Pennsylvania — 130-inch definition; the antique plate is the only road route available to a new buyer, though owners holding a PennDOT letter dated December 1, 2021 keep unrestricted registration until the truck is sold
• North Carolina — 130-inch definition inside a class that grants real road use up to 55 mph
• Massachusetts — open by agency policy; H.4053 would codify it, with the 130-inch figure attached
• Michigan — no dimensional definition; asks only whether the vehicle was built for road use in any country
• New York — no class at all; too heavy to be an ATV, not certified enough to be a car
• Indiana — no length limit, engine floor instead of a ceiling, and a 1,600 lb weight cap
• Ohio — the definition requires non-FMVSS manufacture; road use requires a local ordinance
• Minnesota — the same definition template, plus an individual permit, a sheriff’s inspection and three-inch numbers
• Missouri — titles these trucks as “Non-USA-Std Motor Vehicle”; the local ordinance route is written for off-highway utility vehicles
• Nebraska — the model statute: no length limit, real headroom, lights-on instead of a speed cap
• Colorado — 140 inches, a minimum speed requirement, and a point-by-point pre-emption of the usual refusals; registration opens January 1, 2028
• All 50 states — current position everywhere, with statute and bill numbers

Using This Comparison

The table above is free to reuse under CC BY 4.0, like the rest of the measured data on this site. Credit is all the licence asks:

Narita, F. (2026). How US States Define a Kei Truck. Kei Truck Japan. https://keitruckjapan.com/how-states-define-kei-truck/

If you are a journalist or a legislative staffer and want a specific cut — a particular state checked, or the vehicle figures for a model not listed — write to info@keitruckjapan.com and I will pull it. There is nothing to buy.

FAQ

Why do some states say a kei truck is 130 inches long?

Because 130 inches is 3,302 mm, and Japan’s kei length limit was 3.30 m from 1990 until October 1998. States that borrowed the Japanese envelope borrowed the version in force at the time the language was drafted.

How long is a kei truck actually?

3,395 mm — 133.7 inches — for every model built from 1999 onward, per the manufacturers’ own specifications. Pre-1999 trucks measure 3,295 mm (129.7 in), and the 1990s Honda Acty is shorter still at 3,255 mm (128.1 in).

Does this mean my truck cannot be registered in Pennsylvania or North Carolina?

Not necessarily. The dimension sits in the definition, but these trucks are in fact registered in North Carolina, so the figure is evidently not applied by measurement at the counter. Ask your own office in writing before buying, and keep the answer.

Which state has the best kei truck definition?

Nebraska’s, on the drafting. It has no length limit, allows up to 1,500cc and 67 inches of width, names “foreign-manufactured import vehicle” explicitly, and defines the class by function rather than by copying another country’s regulatory envelope — so it does not go stale when that country changes its rules.

Why does Indiana require an engine of at least 660cc?

Because a floor excludes golf carts and small utility vehicles from the class, rather than excluding kei trucks from it. A kei truck has exactly 660cc, so it qualifies. Indiana’s binding constraint is its 1,600 lb unladen dry weight cap instead.

Update, August 19, 2026: the specification table now distinguishes the two models whose dimensions come from manufacturer archives from the three that come from catalogue databases; the opening states explicitly that the link between 130 inches and Japan’s pre-1998 standard is an inference rather than a documented borrowing; and the 25-year cutoff is described by month of manufacture rather than by calendar year.