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ALPR Results in the Real World

In the world of license plate recognition, it’s easy for software vendors to make claims of 99% accuracy, blah, blah, blah.  

We share in great detail below what Plate Recognizer can (and cannot) do in various camera angle, image resolution, blurriness, and other situations.  We encourage you to use our Free Trial to conduct these tests in your specific environment!

Camera Side Angle

approach: We measured the camera angle with a protractor situated under the vehicle.  Distance from camera to vehicle was 6 feet for all images taken.

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR results were correct up to a 70 degree angle.  It failed at 75 degree angle.

ALPR ANPR Results Camera Angles
ALPR ANPR Results Camera Angles Tough

Image Resolution

approach: What matters in image resolution is actually the pixel width of the license plate itself.  In the original image (2880×2160), the plate is 340×140, or 12% of the original image width.  We resized the images below and indicated the plate’s pixel width.

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR results were correct up to 30 pixels of the plate width.  It failed at 28 pixels of plate width.

ALPR ANPR Results Image Resolution Initial
ALPR ANPR Results Image Resolution Tough

Blurry Images

approach: We applied Paint.net‘s Motion Blur feature at a standard 25 degree angle on various blur distances as stated below.

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR results were correct up to a distance of 27.  It failed at a blur distance of 30.

ALPR ANPR Results Blurry Image Initial
ALPR ANPR Results Blurry Image Tough

Dark Images

approach: We applied Paint.net‘s Lightness levels (under Hue/Saturation Adjustments) to the original image. 

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR results were correct up to a Lightness Level of -93.

ALPR ANPR Results Image Brightness Initial
ALPR ANPR Results Image Brightness Tough

Camera Tilt Angle

approach: We applied Paint.net‘s Rotate Image based on the degrees indicated to the original image. 

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR results were correct up 53 degrees of image rotation.

ALPR ANPR Results Camera Tilt Angle
ALPR ANPR Results Camera Tilt Angles

Plates with Stacked Characters

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR performed well with license plates with stacked characters.  This includes stacked characters in the front, middle or end of the license plate.

ALPR ANPR Results Stacked Characters Maryland
ALPR ANPR Results Stacked Characters

Plates with Icons

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR performed well on license plates with a variety of icons–including icons that look like a letter!

ALPR ANPR Results Icons on Plates
ALPR ANPR Results Icons on Plates

Plates with 2 Lines of Text

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR performed well on license plates with 2 lines of text.  It even correctly decoded plates with different fonts between the top and bottom lines.

ALPR ANPR Results License Plates with 2 lines
ALPR ANPR Results License Plates with two lines

Plates with Tough Characters

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR performed well on license plates with tough characters, including script fonts, fonts of different sizes on the same plate, long license plates, plates with smudges, etc.

ALPR ANPR Results License Plates with tough characters
ALPR ANPR Results License Plates with tough colored characters

License Plates with Snow & Tough Backgrounds

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR is able to distinguish read plates in blizzards and tough backgrounds.

ALPR ANPR Benchmarking Snow
ALPR ANPR Results Plates Tough Backgrounds

Tinted License Plates

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR performed well on tinted license plates from various angles.

ALPR ANPR Results Tinted License Plates
ALPR ANPR Results Tinted License Plates

Vanity License Plates

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR performed well on personalized or vanity license plates, even in situations where some characters are on top of an icon.

ALPR ANPR Results vanity license plates
ALPR ANPR Results personalized license plates

Vehicles with Signs

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR was able to correctly identify the license plate among the many different bumper stickers and signages on the vehicle.  Note that in some cases, the font style and size of the marketing signs are very similar to that of the license plates.

ALPR ANPR Results bumper stickers signs
ALPR ANPR Results vehicles with signage

Night Time Images

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR correclty decoded reflective and non-reflective license plates.

ALPR ANPR Results ir camera license plates
ALPR ANPR Results reflective license plates

Etcetera

results: Plate Recognizer ALPR correclty decoded license plates with emojis, temporary paper license plates and even plates placed on the windshield.

ALPR Emoji license plate temporary paper plate

Free Test Drive

Don’t take our word for it!  We encourage you to test our ALPR in your specific environment!

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Methodology

approach: For some of the above cases, we took images of a single vehicle (black Lexus IS250) to ensure consistency in the analysis.  In other cases, we collected images online or from some of our partners (with permission to share). 

Date: Images were taken on December 12, 2020.  All the analysis was conducted using Snapshot Cloud (version 1.11.0).

ALPR ANPR Results Test Methodology
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