The India visa has a reputation it no longer deserves. For years it meant couriering your passport to an embassy and waiting. For most tourists today it is an online form, a card payment and an email. The confusion that remains is not about difficulty. It is about which option you need, a fee table that is far more country specific than most guides admit, and the swarm of official-looking websites that will charge you several times the real price.
This guide is written for someone flying in from London, Frankfurt, New York, Toronto or Melbourne who wants to know: do I need one, which one, what does it cost, how long can I stay, and where do I apply so I am not overcharged. It covers the electronic tourist visa most first-time visitors use, the separate e-Arrival Card that is now part of every arrival, and when you need a traditional paper visa instead. Every figure here comes from the Indian government's own portal at indianvisaonline.gov.in and from the Bureau of Immigration, checked on 15 September 2026. Treat it as a map of how the system works, and check the portal again on the day you apply.
Do you need a visa to visit India?
Yes. Almost every foreign visitor needs a visa to enter India, and there is no visa-free tourism for UK, European, North American or Australasian passport holders. You arrange it before you travel, not on arrival.
There is no general visa-on-arrival for tourists from these countries. The closest equivalent is the electronic visa, which you apply for online in advance and which is then linked to your passport. The only real question is which type.
What is the India e-Visa, and who can use it?
The India e-Visa is an electronic travel authorisation you apply for online, tied to your passport, that lets you enter for tourism without visiting an embassy. It is the route most leisure travellers now take.
The official portal lists 175 countries and territories as eligible, including the UK, Ireland, the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and almost all of Europe. The document the system emails you is called an ETA, short for Electronic Travel Authorisation. It is not stamped into your passport in advance. Your details are held electronically, an immigration officer verifies them when you land, and the entry stamp goes in then. Some categories cannot use the e-Visa, including holders of diplomatic or official passports, anyone travelling on a document that is not a standard passport, and anyone whose details are endorsed on a parent's or spouse's passport. Pakistani nationals and people of Pakistani origin are outside the scheme and must apply through the regular process.
What are the three tourist e-Visa options?
There are three tourist e-Visas, differing in how long the authorisation lasts rather than in what you may do. All three are multiple entry, and the portal states that the e-Visa is non-extendable and non-convertible.
The 30-day e-Tourist Visa runs for 30 days from the date of your first arrival in India, with multiple entries inside that window. It suits a single trip of a few weeks, which is what most first visits are. The one-year e-Tourist Visa is valid for 365 days from the date the ETA is granted, again with multiple entries, and the five-year version works the same way over five years. For a normal two or three-week holiday the 30-day visa is the sensible default, and on current pricing the longer options cost considerably more than most guides suggest.
One point catches people out: on the longer visas, validity is not the same as how long you may stay. That is a separate rule, covered below.
How much does an India tourist visa cost?
The fee is country specific, and the Indian government publishes a full country-by-country fee table. The figures below come from that official table, dated 8 September 2026 and checked on 15 September 2026. Sterling equivalents are approximate.
The 30-day e-Tourist Visa costs USD 25, roughly GBP 19, for arrivals from July to March, and USD 10, roughly GBP 8, for arrivals in the April to June low season. The one-year e-Tourist Visa costs USD 40, roughly GBP 31. Those rates are identical for the UK, the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Spain and Italy.
The five-year e-Tourist Visa is where the table diverges sharply, and where most travel articles are out of date. For most Western nationalities, including Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Spain and Italy, it is USD 200, roughly GBP 155. For United States nationals it is USD 160, roughly GBP 124. For British nationals it is USD 484, roughly GBP 374. If you have read elsewhere that the five-year visa is USD 80, that figure comes from an older announcement and no longer matches the published table.
On top of whichever fee applies, the payment gateway adds a bank transaction charge of 3 per cent, stated on the portal, so your card is debited slightly more than the headline figure. The fee is non-refundable, because it pays for processing the application rather than for a successful outcome.
Two things follow. Check your own nationality's row rather than assuming a common Western rate, because the five-year column varies a great deal. And these are the only charges on the government site: if a website quotes a large flat fee for a simple 30-day tourist visa, you are on an agent's site paying a margin for a form you can complete yourself in about twenty minutes. Confirm the current amount on the portal on the day you apply.
How long can you actually stay in India?
On the 30-day visa you can stay up to 30 days from your first entry, and that is straightforward. On the one-year and five-year visas the rule is different, and this is the detail most people miss.
The official portal states that on the one-year and five-year e-Tourist Visas, the maximum stay in India during one calendar year must not exceed 180 days. That is a cumulative annual cap, not a per-trip allowance, so a traveller who spends four months in India early in the year has only two months of that year's allowance left, however many entries the visa permits.
You will still find older guidance, including on some Indian mission websites, describing a per-visit limit of 90 days for most nationalities and 180 days for US, UK, Canadian and Japanese nationals. That wording does not appear on the current portal, and I would not plan a long stay around it. If a long or repeated stay is central to your trip, check the condition printed on your own granted ETA and confirm the rule on the portal for your passport before committing to dates.
Where do you apply, and how do you avoid the copycat sites?
You apply on one website only: the Indian government's official e-Visa portal at indianvisaonline.gov.in. Everything else is a middleman.
This matters more than any other single point here. Search for an India visa and the first results are often commercial sites with names and layouts designed to look official. They will usually process a real visa, but they charge a service fee on top of the government fee, sometimes several times the actual cost, for the same form you can complete yourself. Some are legitimate agencies, some are close to a scam, and none are the government. The portal states directly that the Government of India does not authorise any agent or intermediary to charge fees for emergency visas, express visas, e-Visas or the e-Arrival Card. The only genuine sites are indianvisaonline.gov.in and the Bureau of Immigration at boi.gov.in.
If you would rather not deal with any of it, a travel company or a visa agency you have chosen deliberately can handle the application, and that is a fair use of an agent. Being funnelled onto a lookalike site by a search advert is not. When we plan a trip for someone, pointing them at the right site and the right fee is part of how we start.
A traveller holding two passports before a trip.
What documents do you need?
The e-Visa needs surprisingly little. You will need a passport, a photograph and a payment card, and you can complete the whole thing at a kitchen table.
Your passport must have at least six months' validity and at least two blank pages for the immigration stamps. You will upload a recent colour photograph as a JPEG of 10 kilobytes to 1 megabyte, with equal height and width, full face front on, eyes open, no spectacles, on a plain light or white background, with no borders or shadows. You will also upload your passport's photo and details page as a PDF of 10 kilobytes to 300 kilobytes. You will need a debit or credit card, and you should be ready to give your travel dates, your first address in India such as your hotel, and basic details about the trip. You are expected to hold a return or onward ticket and sufficient funds. If your passport is close to expiring, renew it first, because the visa is linked to the passport number you enter.
How does the application work, step by step?
The process is a single online session followed by a short wait. In practice it looks like this.
You open the official portal, choose the e-Tourist Visa and your visa length, and complete the form with your passport and travel details. You upload your photograph and passport page, then pay by card. The system issues an application ID so you can check progress, and the ETA arrives by email as a PDF. The portal instructs you to carry a copy of the ETA at the time of travel, so print it or save it somewhere you can show it without a data connection. That pairing, ETA plus matching passport, is what you present at check-in and at Indian immigration.
How far in advance should you apply?
Apply at least four days ahead, and ideally a week or two. The e-Visa has both a floor and a ceiling on timing, and both are set out on the portal.
You must apply a minimum of four days before your date of arrival, so it cannot be done in the departure lounge. At the other end, an application can be made up to 120 days in advance of your proposed travel date, the same window for all three tourist sub-types. Official guidance is that an application may take 72 hours or more, and that you should contact the e-Visa helpdesk if you have heard nothing after 72 hours. Most straightforward applications land inside that window, but I would not rely on it.
The practical sweet spot is to apply one to two weeks before departure, once flights are booked and your passport is in hand. In the busy winter season, give yourself the fuller two weeks in case processing slows.
What is the e-Arrival Card, and do you need one?
Yes, and it is the newest step most guides still omit. Since 1 October 2025 India has replaced the paper disembarkation card, the landing form crew used to hand out, with a digital e-Arrival Card filed online before you fly.
The Bureau of Immigration states that foreign nationals and Overseas Citizen of India cardholders submit the e-Arrival Card online within 72 hours before arrival. It is filed free on boi.gov.in, on indianvisaonline.gov.in, or through the official Indian Visa Su-Swagatam mobile app, and the Bureau is explicit that it is arrival information rather than a visa. It does not replace your e-Visa. It is simply the form your details now arrive on.
Two cautions. The government authorises no agent to charge a fee for the e-Arrival Card, so any site asking for money to file it is charging you for something free. And because the transition from paper is recent, confirm the current position on boi.gov.in shortly before you fly.
Which airports, seaports and land crossings can you enter on an e-Visa?
The e-Visa covers a wide network of designated entry points. As of 15 September 2026 the portal lists 36 airports, 38 seaports and 12 land ports for entry on an e-Visa.
The airport list includes Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Cochin, Goa at both Dabolim and Mopa, Ahmedabad, Amritsar, Jaipur, Varanasi, Thiruvananthapuram, Guwahati and Port Blair. The seaports cover cruise arrivals at Mumbai, Cochin, Mormugao, Chennai, New Mangalore and others.
The land crossings are worth flagging, because older guides state flatly that you cannot enter India overland on an e-Visa. That is no longer accurate. The portal lists twelve designated land ports for e-Visa entry: Raxaul, Rupaidiha, Darranga, Jogbani, Agartala, Gede, Ghojadanga, Haridaspur, Jaigaon, Dawki, Moreh and Attari. If your route crosses from Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan or Myanmar, check that your specific crossing is on that list, because one that is not named will still turn you back. For departure, the portal lists a wider set of authorised check posts, including airports, seaports, land check posts and five rail check posts.
What happens at immigration when you land?
At the airport your e-Visa is verified and your biometrics are taken, then you are stamped in. It is a normal immigration queue, with one extra step.
When you reach the counter, you present your passport and your printed or saved ETA, having already filed the e-Arrival Card. The officer checks your details against the electronic record, takes your fingerprints and a photograph, asks a question or two, and stamps your passport with the entry date. That is the moment your stay officially begins, which is why the clock on a 30-day visa runs from arrival rather than from the day the visa was granted. Keep the ETA accessible, have your first address ready, and allow extra time after a long-haul flight, because the biometric step slows queues at peak arrival hours.
An open passport with many ink stamps lying on a table.
When do you need a regular paper visa instead?
You need a traditional sticker visa when your trip falls outside what the e-Visa allows. For most holidays it does not, but there are clear cases.
Choose a regular visa if your nationality is not among the 175 eligible, if you want a longer stay than the annual limit permits, if you plan to enter at a crossing that is not a designated e-Visa entry point, or if you intend to visit a Protected, Restricted or Cantonment Area, which the e-Visa does not cover at all. You also need a regular visa if your purpose is not tourism, for example employment, study, journalism or long-term residence. A regular visa is applied for through an Indian mission or an authorised visa application centre, often run by a private outsourcing firm such as VFS Global, and it involves submitting your physical passport for a sticker. It costs more and takes longer, and fees vary by country, so confirm the current cost with your local Indian mission. For a standard two or three-week holiday flown in and out of a major airport, you will not need it.
Can you extend or change an e-Visa once you are in India?
No. The portal states that the e-Visa is non-extendable and non-convertible. You cannot add days to it, and you cannot turn it into a business, student or employment visa from inside the country.
If you reach the end of your permitted stay, the expectation is that you leave rather than renew from inside India. On a multiple-entry visa you may be able to exit and re-enter, subject to your visa's validity and the annual stay cap, but you cannot extend a stay that is running out. Choose the right visa length before you travel rather than hoping to sort it later.
What about permits for restricted regions?
Some parts of India need an extra permit, and the e-Visa does not work in those areas at all. The portal states it plainly: the e-Visa is not valid for visiting Protected, Restricted or Cantonment Areas.
Certain border and tribal areas fall under a Protected Area Permit or Restricted Area Permit regime, meaning foreign visitors need an additional government permit to enter. This can apply to parts of the northeastern states, some border zones near Ladakh and sections of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, and the rules are relaxed or tightened at short notice. Popular regions such as Rajasthan, Kerala, Goa and the Golden Triangle need no such permit, so most first-time itineraries are unaffected. But if your plans include the far northeast, high-altitude border country or protected islands, check both whether a permit is required and whether you need a regular visa rather than an e-Visa, because an e-Visa plus a permit is not always a valid combination. This is where a good ground operator earns its keep, sorting permits before you arrive rather than leaving you to discover the requirement at a checkpoint.
What do first-time visitors get wrong about the India visa?
Most visa problems are avoidable and come from a handful of predictable mistakes. The common ones are:
- Applying on a lookalike website and overpaying an agent's markup for the government's own form.
- Budgeting USD 80 for the five-year visa on the strength of an old article, when the published table now shows USD 200 for most nationalities, USD 160 for US nationals and USD 484 for British nationals.
- Assuming a one-year or five-year visa lets you stay a year or five years at a stretch, when the portal caps total stay at 180 days in any calendar year.
- Applying at the very last minute and finding they are inside the four-day minimum window.
- Forgetting the e-Arrival Card, which is a separate free filing within 72 hours of arrival.
- Renewing a passport after applying, so the visa is linked to a passport they no longer carry.
- Assuming any land border will do, when only twelve named crossings accept an e-Visa.
- Forgetting to print or save the ETA and having nothing to show at check-in.
Who should choose which visa?
The right visa follows from the shape of your trip, not from wanting the longest option. As a rough guide:
- A single holiday of up to a month: the 30-day e-Tourist Visa. It is by far the cheapest and covers most first visits.
- Two or more trips within a year, or uncertain dates: the one-year e-Tourist Visa at USD 40.
- Frequent visits over several years: the five-year e-Tourist Visa, but price it for your own nationality first, because at USD 200 or more it only pays across many trips.
- Non-tourist purposes, restricted areas, an undesignated land crossing, or a stay beyond the annual limit: a regular paper visa through an Indian mission.
If you are unsure, start with the trip you are actually planning and choose the shortest visa that comfortably covers it. You can always apply again next time.
Frequently asked questions
Can I get a visa on arrival in India as a tourist?
Not in the walk-up sense. There is no general visa-on-arrival for UK, European, North American or Australasian tourists. You apply for the e-Visa online in advance, and it is verified when you land. Arrange it before you fly.
How long does the India e-Visa take to process?
The official guidance is that an application may take 72 hours or more, and that you should contact the e-Visa helpdesk if you have heard nothing after 72 hours. You must apply at least four days before arrival, and applying one to two weeks ahead gives sensible margin, especially in the busy winter season.
How much does an India tourist visa cost?
Checked on 15 September 2026 against the government's country-wise table: the 30-day e-Tourist Visa is USD 25 for July to March arrivals and USD 10 for April to June arrivals; the one-year visa is USD 40; and the five-year visa is USD 200 for most Western nationalities, USD 160 for US nationals and USD 484 for British nationals. A 3 per cent bank charge is added. Fees are country specific and change, so confirm your own row on the official portal.
Which website is the official India visa site?
The only official portals are indianvisaonline.gov.in and boi.gov.in. Many search results are agents or lookalike sites that add a large service fee. The government states it has authorised no agent to charge fees for e-Visas or the e-Arrival Card.
Do I need to fill in an e-Arrival Card as well as a visa?
Yes. Since 1 October 2025 the paper disembarkation card has been replaced by a digital e-Arrival Card, submitted free online within 72 hours before arrival via boi.gov.in, indianvisaonline.gov.in or the Su-Swagatam app. It is separate from your visa and does not replace it.
Can I extend my tourist visa while I am in India?
No. The portal states the e-Visa is non-extendable and non-convertible. If you want longer, choose a longer visa before you travel, or plan to exit and re-enter within the validity and the 180-day annual stay cap.
Does a valid visa let me go anywhere in India?
No. The e-Visa is explicitly not valid for Protected, Restricted or Cantonment Areas, which include parts of the northeast, some border zones and sections of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Mainstream tourist areas are unaffected, but check ahead if you are heading somewhere remote.
Getting the visa right, then forgetting about it
The India visa is the one piece of planning where being careful genuinely matters, and also the one that is over in an afternoon. Apply on the official portal, check your own nationality's fee row rather than a rate quoted in an old article, file the e-Arrival Card in the 72 hours before you fly, mind the annual stay cap on the longer options, and confirm the fees and rules on the government site on the day you apply, because they do move. Everything above was verified on 15 September 2026 and is a guide, not a substitute for the portal.
We plan private, personalised India journeys for visitors who would rather spend their attention on the trip than on the paperwork, and getting the right visa sorted is part of how we start. If you would like your route, pace and logistics handled end to end, Plan my India trip