Four visa systems and three arrival forms, on one page
A four-country journey crosses four separate immigration regimes, and since 2025 three of them also require a digital arrival form that is nothing to do with the visa. Everything on this page is current for September 2026. Where a rule changed recently, the date of the change is given, because the internet is full of the old version.
The four countries at a glance
One row per country. The last column is the one most people miss entirely: an arrival form is mandatory, free, filed online, and separate from the visa. Having a valid visa and no arrival form still stops you at the desk.
| Country | Route in | Length | Cost | Mandatory digital form |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vietnam | E-visa, all nationalities, or 45-day exemption for 24 countries | Up to 90 days on the e-visa | Official portal fee only | None |
| Cambodia | E-visa at evisa.gov.kh, or visa on arrival at the airports | 30 days, single entry | USD 30 plus USD 6 processing | Cambodia e-Arrival (CeA), free |
| Laos | Visa on arrival, or e-visa at laoevisa.gov.la | 30 days | About USD 30 – 45 by nationality | Lao Digital Immigration Form (LDIF), free |
| Thailand | Visa exemption for 60 countries and territories | 30 days from 15 September 2026 | Free | Thailand Digital Arrival Card (TDAC), free |
Vietnam
Vietnam runs the most open of the four systems. The e-visa is available to every nationality, for stays of up to 90 days, single or multiple entry, applied for online at the Immigration Department portal. It is the route we recommend to almost everyone, because a 90-day single-entry permission removes every subsequent question about how long you are staying and whether you are coming back through Vietnam later in the route.
Twenty-four countries also hold a 45-day visa exemption, among them the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium, Poland, Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Japan and South Korea. If you hold one of those passports and your Vietnam segment is under 45 days, you need nothing at all.
United States, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand passports get no Vietnamese exemption. Those four nationalities must hold an e-visa, and there is no visa on arrival for them without a sponsoring letter. Travellers assume that because their friends from London walked in, they can too. They cannot, and the discovery is usually made at the check-in desk in their home airport.
Apply four to six weeks out. The e-visa is issued as a PDF; print it and carry the paper, because airline check-in staff routinely ask to see it and a phone with a flat battery is not an argument. Check the entry port named on the application matches the airport you are actually landing at.
Cambodia
The Cambodian e-visa costs USD 30 plus a USD 6 processing fee, is valid for 30 days single entry, and takes about three working days. It is issued at evisa.gov.kh, which is the only official site. Visa on arrival is also available at the airports at USD 30, and for most travellers arriving by air the choice between the two is a matter of whether you would rather queue on arrival or fill in a form at home.
The e-Arrival form is separate and mandatory
The Cambodia e-Arrival form, CeA, is a different thing from the visa. It is free, it is filed at arrival.gov.kh, and it must be submitted within seven days of arrival. Holding an e-visa does not exempt you; holding a visa on arrival does not exempt you. It replaces the paper arrival and customs cards and it applies to every traveller including children.
One practical note on airports. International traffic at Phnom Penh moved to Techo International (KTI) on 9 September 2025, 19 km south of the city; the old airport now handles domestic flights and private jets only. Siem Reap–Angkor International (SAI) opened in October 2023 and sits 40 to 50 km from town, a 45 to 60 minute transfer, which is worth knowing when you are estimating how long the immigration and transfer day will take.
Laos
Laos issues a 30-day visa on arrival to most nationalities at roughly USD 30 to 45 depending on passport, and also runs an e-visa at laoevisa.gov.la. For an arrival by air at Vientiane or Luang Prabang either works, and the e-visa is the calmer option.
Two Lao rules that break itineraries
- A Lao e-visa is not valid at any Vietnamese land border. If your route crosses from Vietnam into Laos by road, the e-visa will not be accepted, and only the Dansavan / Lao Bao crossing issues a visa on arrival. Every other Vietnam–Laos land crossing needs a visa obtained in advance through an embassy.
- The Lao Digital Immigration Form, LDIF, has been mandatory since September 2025 at Vientiane, Luang Prabang and Pakse airports and at the Nong Khai friendship bridge from Thailand. It is free and filed online before arrival. It is not a visa and it does not replace one.
This is one of the reasons our Laos legs are almost always flown or entered by rail rather than driven from Vietnam. Hanoi to Luang Prabang is 1 h 10 with daily Lao Airlines service and Vietnam Airlines three times a week, and the Vientiane–Luang Prabang train covers in 1 h 50 what the road takes about ten hours to do. A land crossing from Vietnam saves nothing and adds a visa problem.
Thailand
Thailand changes its exemption on 15 September 2026, and this is the rule most likely to be wrong on any page you read that has not been updated. From that date the visa exemption is 30 days, not 60, for the sixty countries and territories that hold it — the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Japan and most of Europe among them. One extension of up to 30 further days can be obtained at a Thai immigration office inside the country.
- Seychelles and Mauritius passports receive 15 days rather than 30.
- Visa-exempt entries by land are capped at twice per calendar year. Arrivals by air are uncapped.
- Anyone who entered Thailand before 15 September 2026 keeps the 60 days they were granted on entry; the change is not retrospective.
- For a 14 to 28 day journey the 30-day exemption is ample, so in practice the change affects almost nobody on our routes. It affects people planning to stay on afterwards.
The Thailand Digital Arrival Card
The TDAC is mandatory and free, and it is filed within 72 hours of arrival at tdac.immigration.go.th. That is the only official address. A large number of sites rank above it in search results and charge USD 15 to 40 for what is a free government form; they are not official, they are not faster, and several of them collect passport data you would rather not hand over. If a site asks for a card number to file your arrival card, close it.
The closed land border, and what it does to entry planning
All four crossings are shut — Poipet–Aranyaprathet, Cham Yeam–Hat Lek, O’Smach–Chong Jom and Ban Pakard–Pailin. Armed clashes followed in July 2025 and again in December 2025. The ceasefire is holding through 2026 and Thai authorities have said there is no plan to reopen this year. Bangkok to Siem Reap and Bangkok to Phnom Penh are flights of about 1 h 15, and there is no overland alternative to sell.
For entry planning this cuts two ways. The obvious one is that any itinerary showing an overland Bangkok to Siem Reap day cannot be operated, and an operator still publishing it will substitute something once you are already in the region. The less obvious one is a piece of good news: because there is no land entry available on that frontier, the Thai cap of two visa-exempt land entries per calendar year is irrelevant to a Thailand–Cambodia journey. Every crossing between those two countries is by air, and air arrivals are uncapped.
The cap does still matter if your route enters Thailand overland from Laos at the Nong Khai bridge, or from Malaysia, and you have already done so earlier in the same calendar year. That is rare on our journeys and we check it during the build rather than leaving it for you to discover.
What we do for clients, and what we deliberately do not
Visas are the part of a long journey where the money most often goes to the wrong people. Our position on it is fixed and it is not a commercial one.
We tell you exactly what to apply for and when
A written list per passport in the party: which visa, which exemption if any, which arrival forms, and the week each one should be filed. Vietnam four to six weeks out; Cambodia about a week; the arrival cards in the final 72 hours to seven days depending on the country.
We send the official URLs
evisa.gov.kh, arrival.gov.kh, laoevisa.gov.la, tdac.immigration.go.th and the Vietnamese Immigration Department portal. Nothing else. The addresses go in the pre-departure pack and again in a reminder email.
We do not charge a handling fee
The official portals cost between nothing and USD 36. A handling fee on top of that would be a margin on a form, and we would rather earn on the journey. There is no line for visa services on any quote we issue.
We do not apply on your behalf
Immigration applications carry your passport data and your declarations, and they should be made by you on a government site. We will sit on a call while you do it if the form is confusing. We will not take your passport scan and file it for you.
The third-party sites that outrank the official portals exist because the official ones are hard to find and plainly designed. They charge four to ten times the real fee for the visa applications and they charge for arrival cards that are free. Knowing the correct address is worth more than any service anyone can sell you here, which is why the addresses are printed above rather than kept behind an enquiry form. If anything on your list is unclear, write to us and we will answer without a booking attached.
Send us the passports in your party
Nationalities and the countries on your route are enough for a written visa and arrival-form list, with dates.
Questions travellers ask most
We hold US passports. What do we actually need for all four countries?
A Vietnamese e-visa, applied for at the Immigration Department portal — there is no exemption for US passports and this is the step most often missed. A Cambodian e-visa or visa on arrival at USD 30, plus the free Cambodia e-Arrival form. A Lao visa on arrival or e-visa, plus the free LDIF. Nothing for Thailand except the free TDAC, filed within 72 hours of arrival.
Is the Thai visa exemption 30 days or 60?
Thirty days, from 15 September 2026, for the sixty countries and territories that hold the exemption, with one extension of up to 30 more days available at a Thai immigration office. Seychelles and Mauritius get 15 days. Anyone who entered before that date keeps the 60 days they were granted. Any page still saying 60 for a new arrival is out of date.
Do we need an arrival card as well as a visa?
In Cambodia, Laos and Thailand, yes, and they are separate from the visa. The Cambodia e-Arrival is filed at arrival.gov.kh within seven days of arrival, the Lao LDIF before arrival at Vientiane, Luang Prabang or Pakse airports and the Nong Khai bridge, and the Thai TDAC at tdac.immigration.go.th within 72 hours. All three are free. Vietnam has no equivalent form.
Can we cross from Thailand into Cambodia by land?
No. Every crossing has been closed since 23 June 2025 and Thai authorities have said there is no plan to reopen during 2026. Bangkok to Siem Reap and Bangkok to Phnom Penh are flights of about 1 h 15. See flying between countries for how the sectors fit into a route.
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