OC How to Tell if You Need the Sprout Mark While Driving

tl;dr — if you’re exempt, they put a stamp on the back of your new license indicating as much. Otherwise, you have to display the newbie/beginner’s mark (初心者(しょしんしゃ)マーク) for the first year.

Also, you have to buy the mark yourself. There are magnet and suction cup versions (for those driving aluminum body vehicles I guess). Front and back.

Story:
Just got my license converted today, and apparently I got my passport close enough to moving over that they couldn’t prove that I’d had my license and resided in my home country for more than a year, which means the beginner’s mark ends up being necessary.

But since my Japanese is only like 70% (and extra worse for formal and legal matters), I wasn’t 100% sure how to tell, especially as only the first person I spoke with said anything about the mark.

I finally found a post explaining it over on that one site, but figured it’d be useful to post this one here as well, starting to rebuild knowledge.