Know Your Traffic Signs
Know Your Traffic Signs.
Know Your Traffic Signs is the Department for Transport's illustrated guide to the traffic signs, signals and road markings most road users meet, published as a companion to The Highway Code. The 2023 edition reflects TSRGD 2016 as amended.
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Always check the official page for a newer edition.
For signage and wayfinding
What it asks of your signs
- 01Use it as the quick visual index: find the sign a client is describing, then go to TSRGD and the working drawings for the real artwork.
- 02It is a good briefing document for clients and estates teams who need to understand why a car park or site entrance sign has to look a certain way.
- 03It is not a design source. DfT says that if it differs from TSRGD, TSRGD always takes precedence.
- 04It explains the colour logic of direction signs (blue for motorways, green for primary routes, white for non-primary routes, brown for tourist destinations), which helps you avoid borrowing those colours in a private wayfinding palette.
- 05The 2023 edition adds guidance specific to Wales and to Scotland.
What it is
Know Your Traffic Signs illustrates and explains the most common traffic signs road users are likely to see. DfT first published it in 1975. The 2023 edition added new guidance and images on clean air and low emission zones, tunnel restriction codes, bus gates, parallel crossings and parking for electric taxis, updated sections on bus lanes, parking places, pedestrian and cycle zones, motorway signals, road works and bridge height warnings, and added guidance specific to Wales and Scotland.
The book explains that responsibility for traffic signs is split between National Highways in England, the Welsh Government, the Scottish Government, the Department for Infrastructure in Northern Ireland and local highway authorities, and that signs must conform to TSRGD 2016 (as amended) or the equivalent in the devolved administrations.
How to use it on a wayfinding scheme
Treat it as a reference and a communication tool. When a client asks for a 'height limit sign' or a 'no entry for vehicles' at a delivery yard, Know Your Traffic Signs lets you show them the prescribed sign and its meaning in seconds. For artwork, move on to the TSRGD working drawings and the Traffic Signs Manual. DfT's companion image library, drawn from this book, is licensed for media reproduction and is not meant for sign manufacture.
Design and use can differ in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and the book tells readers to check the information published in those jurisdictions. Ireland's signs are different again: use the Irish Traffic Signs Manual there.
Our hosted copy
The 2023 PDF states that it may be re-used under the Open Government Licence v3.0, excluding logos. We host an unaltered copy for convenience; the GOV.UK page remains the authoritative source and also links to HTML versions of each section.
Editions and history
First published in 1975. The previous GOV.UK edition was the seventeenth impression (2016), based on TSRGD 2002. Replaced by the updated edition published in November 2023, with image corrections on pages 53 and 136 in December 2023.
Sources checked
- gov.uk/government/publications/know-your-traffic-signs
- assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/656ef4271104cf0013fa74ef/know-your-traffic-signs-dft.pdf
- gov.uk/guidance/traffic-sign-images
A summary in our own words, checked on 16 October 2026. It is not the document itself and not legal advice.
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