Caravan towing calculator
Enter your car's kerbweight, its towing limit and a caravan's MTPLM. This page works out the caravan's weight as a percentage of the car's kerbweight, sets it against what the two caravanning clubs recommend, and checks the MTPLM against the towing limit. The sums run in your browser: nothing you type is sent or kept.
Calculator
Normally in the car's handbook.
Usually in the handbook or specification sheet.
On the caravan's weight plate.
Enter the kerbweight, the towing limit and the MTPLM to see the result. Nothing is worked out from a figure you have not entered.
What the result is measured against
- The Camping and Caravanning Club recommends you only tow a caravan that weighs 85 per cent or less of your car's kerbweight. It says those experienced at towing may go up to 100 per cent, and that nobody should tow a caravan heavier than the towing limit of the car.
- The Caravan and Motorhome Club recommends a towed load of no more than 85% of the car's kerbweight for beginners and perhaps up to 90% for experienced towers, and says never to exceed 100%. It matches on the car's kerbweight and the caravan's MTPLM, the car at its lightest and the caravan at its heaviest.
- The towing limit. GOV.UK says most cars have a maximum weight they can tow, usually listed in the handbook or specification sheet.
- The gross train weight. GOV.UK says this is the weight of the fully loaded car plus the fully loaded trailer and must not be exceeded. The Camping and Caravanning Club's check is that the car's MAM plus the caravan's MTPLM must not come to more than it.
The percentages are the clubs' advice, not law. The Caravan and Motorhome Club says towing up to a maker's higher stated capacity would not be illegal, though it would not recommend towing anything heavier than the car's kerbweight. The 85% towing guideline has the rest, with the width and length limits.
What this calculator cannot tell you
- Whether your licence covers it. That depends on when you passed your test. What GOV.UK says is in Driving a motorhome on a car licence and in the towing guide above.
- The noseweight. The Camping and Caravanning Club says the caravan's noseweight should not exceed the car's towball limit or the caravan's own noseweight limit. This page asks for neither. The caravan noseweight calculator does.
- What your car's plate says. The page compares the numbers you type and cannot check them. The limits that bind are the ones in the car's handbook and on its plate. GOV.UK says that if the VIN plate lists no train weight, you should not use the vehicle for towing.
- Whether the two are safe together. A result inside every figure here is not a statement that a particular car and caravan tow well.
If you are selling a caravan
Put the MTPLM from the plate in the advert, so a buyer can run this sum for their own car. Listing is free. Selling your caravan compares the ways to sell.