Free license plate recognition for your cameras
Litmus NVR reads license plates on every camera in a place, turns each plate into a card, and runs actions for registered, unregistered or specific vehicles. It is free and runs on your own computer.
What it does
- A card for each plate. History > Cards > Vehicles shows one card per plate. Open a card to see every stay of that vehicle in time order.
- Search by part of a plate. Type part of a plate number, or a description such as “white truck”, to find vehicles.
- Registered and unknown vehicles. Register plates one by one, in bulk, or from history. Alerts can run for a registered vehicle, an unregistered vehicle, or one specific vehicle.
- Tolerates one misread character. By default a registered vehicle is still recognized when one character is misread.
- Find similar vehicles even without a plate. Pick a vehicle in the video and search by appearance: type, color and shape.
Which plates it reads
| Plate type | What it reads |
|---|---|
| International plates | Plate numbers of capital letters A to Z and digits 0 to 9, up to 10 characters. Uses an open model (fast-plate-ocr) trained on plates from 65 countries, including the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Brazil, Mexico and Australia |
| Korean plates | 7- and 8-character plates, commercial and electric vehicle plates, older plates with a region name, and two-row plates |
Accuracy has not been verified for plates from countries outside the 65. Characters in other scripts, such as Arabic or Thai, are left out of the plate number.
Turn it on
- Install Litmus NVR and connect your cameras.
- On the Settings tab, open Vehicle recognition, turn on the switch, review the license plate notice and click Agree and turn on.
- Choose the plate type and click Save. The defaults work for most sites.
- Register vehicles on the Registry tab, then create alerts on the Actions tab.
Before you use plate recognition
Plate numbers, photos and appearance data are stored only on the computer running Litmus. A plate number can become personal data when combined with other information, and automated plate recognition is restricted in some regions. Check and follow the rules for your site, such as signage and retention limits.
Questions
Which cameras work best for reading plates?
Cameras that see plates clearly. Record at 1080p or higher on cameras that need to show plates, and keep them lit at night.
Can it open a gate for registered cars?
With Home Assistant, yes: add a Home Assistant action, then in an automation check that sub_label is not empty, or that recognized_license_plate equals a plate number.
Is Litmus NVR really free?
Yes. Every feature is free with no camera limit. Live View over a direct connection is unlimited.