Nearside and offside: which side of the car is which?
On a UK car, the nearside is the left side and the offside is the right side, looked at as if you're sitting in the driver's seat facing forwards. On a right-hand-drive car, that makes the nearside the passenger side and the offside the driver's side. So "nearside front tyre" on your MOT means the front left tyre.
Why the MOT uses these words
Left and right depend on where you're standing. If a mechanic is facing the front of the car and says "the left headlight", they could mean either one. Nearside and offside are fixed to the car, so there's no confusion between the tester, the garage and you.
The name comes from the kerb. In the UK we drive on the left, so the left side of the car is the side nearest the kerb. The right side is the one further off, towards the middle of the road.
The abbreviations
Garages, parts suppliers and some MOT records shorten these to four letters or fewer:
| Abbreviation | Means | Plain English |
|---|---|---|
| NSF | Nearside front | Front left |
| OSF | Offside front | Front right |
| NSR | Nearside rear | Rear left |
| OSR | Offside rear | Rear right |
| N/S or NS | Nearside | Left side |
| O/S or OS | Offside | Right side |
When you're ordering parts, it helps to say both. "Front left, nearside" on a parts order stops someone sending you the wrong one.
The left-hand-drive catch
Nearside and offside are about left and right on the car, not about where the steering wheel is. On a left-hand-drive import in the UK, the nearside is still the left, which on that car is the driver's side.
That trips people up. If you own a left-hand-drive car and your MOT says "nearside front", it's the front left wheel, the one in front of you as you drive.
What about front and rear?
Front and rear mean what you'd expect. On the MOT you'll sometimes see an item with no side at all, like "front brake pads wearing thin". That usually means the item applies across the axle, or the tester didn't specify one side. Brake pads are replaced in pairs across an axle anyway.
Let the decoder translate it
When you paste your MOT into the MOT advisory decoder, every item with a side marked on it gets translated, so "Offside Rear Shock absorber has a light misting of oil" shows as rear right, on the driver's side. If you want to know what the advisories themselves mean, start with what an MOT advisory means.
Got more than one advisory?
Paste your whole MOT result into the decoder. It explains every line, sorts them by urgency and adds up a rough repair budget.
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