Vietnam Visa for Indians: Rules, Fees and How to Apply

An Indian passport does not get you into Vietnam visa free, whatever a travel reel told you. For mainland Vietnam you arrange a visa before you fly, and for almost every Indian tourist that means the online e visa, applied for yourself on the government portal for roughly Rs 2,200 per person. The process is simple once you know which website is real and which fields trigger a rejection.

Vietnam visa for Indians: the short answer

• There is no visa free entry for Indians into mainland Vietnam. Lists mentioning "15 days visa free" apply to nationals of the UK, France, Germany, Japan and South Korea, not to India.
• The Vietnam e visa is the default route: valid up to 90 days, single or multiple entry, applied online before departure.
• Vietnam visa on arrival still exists, but it needs a pre-approval letter from a licensed agent inside Vietnam and only works if you land by air.
• Phu Quoc island has a separate 30 day exemption with strict routing conditions, covered below. This is where most guides quietly mislead you.

Vietnam e visa: fee, validity and how to apply

The only official site is evisa.gov.vn, run by the Vietnam Immigration Department. Search results are crowded with lookalike portals built from the same three words, charging Rs 5,000 to Rs 9,000 to fill in the same form for you. Type the address by hand.

Approximate Vietnam visa fee at the time of writing. Confirm the current number on the official portal before you pay:

• Single entry, up to 90 days: about USD 25, roughly Rs 2,200
• Multiple entry, up to 90 days: about USD 50, roughly Rs 4,400
• The fee is not refundable. If you are rejected, or you mistype your passport number, that money is gone.
• The fee is the same whatever stay length you request, so ask for a window wider than your booked dates.

The flow: create an account, upload a scan of your passport bio page and a portrait photo, fill in your dates plus entry and exit checkpoints, pay by card, then track status with the registration code. Official processing is three working days, but apply at least two weeks out, and three to four weeks around Tet (late January to mid February) when Vietnamese offices slow down.

Print the approved e visa in colour. Check-in staff at Delhi and Mumbai have refused boarding to travellers carrying it only on a phone.

Vietnam visa on arrival: who should skip it

Vietnam visa on arrival is not a walk-up service. You pay an agency in Vietnam for an approval letter, carry the printout, then pay a stamping fee in cash dollars at the airport, usually USD 25 single entry or USD 50 multiple. Add the agency charge of roughly USD 15 to USD 30 and it costs more than the e visa, and the counter queue at Noi Bai or Tan Son Nhat can run 45 minutes at peak. It works only at air borders, so it is no help if you cross overland from Cambodia or Laos.

Skip it unless you fly within 72 hours and cannot risk online processing, or your e visa was rejected and there is no time to reapply.

The Phu Quoc rule most guides get wrong

Phu Quoc offers 30 days visa free, which plenty of articles present as a free pass for Indians. The catch is routing. You must arrive at Phu Quoc on an international flight, or transit through another Vietnamese airport without formally entering the country. Land in Ho Chi Minh City, clear immigration and take a domestic hop, and the exemption is void, because you needed a visa at that first airport.

With no regular direct flight from an Indian metro to Phu Quoc, using this means routing via Singapore or Bangkok, and it pins you to the island. Adding Hanoi or Hoi An means a normal e visa anyway.

Documents to keep ready

• Passport valid at least six months beyond your arrival date, with two blank pages
• A colour scan of the bio page with all four corners visible and no glare
• A recent portrait photo, white background, no spectacles, neutral expression
• The name and address of your first hotel, for the temporary residence field
• Your exact entry and exit checkpoints, decided before you start the form
• Return ticket and hotel bookings, occasionally asked for at immigration
• A card enabled for international online payments
• A separate application for each child, including infants

Arrival formalities

There is no routine online arrival form or health declaration for tourists any more. You hand over your passport and printed e visa, give a photo and fingerprints, and collect the entry stamp. A customs declaration is needed only above the limits, broadly cash or equivalent over USD 5,000 and gold over 300 grams. Keep your hotel address handy.

Why applications get rejected or delayed

• Name fields filled in wrong. Many Indian passports carry a blank surname line, and applicants then split or swap names. Reproduce the passport exactly.
• A cropped, dark or glare-heavy passport scan. This is the single most common reason for a resubmission.
• Choosing an entry checkpoint you do not actually use. You cannot amend it later, you reapply and pay again.
• A passport that drops under six months of validity by your arrival date.
• Card payment failing on the portal. Indian cards sometimes bounce, so keep a second card ready.
• A previous overstay in Vietnam on record.

Know before you go

• Direct flights run from Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata to Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City on IndiGo, VietJet and Vietnam Airlines, return fares often around Rs 20,000 to Rs 35,000 off peak.
• Overstaying even by a day means a fine and paperwork at the airport, and extensions from inside Vietnam are slow and expensive, so build in a buffer.
• Vegetarians should learn "an chay" (vegetarian) and "khong nuoc mam" (no fish sauce), which hides in most savoury dishes. Buddhist com chay canteens are cheap and everywhere, and Hanoi's Old Quarter and District 1 in Ho Chi Minh City both have Indian restaurants.
• Carry a little US dollar cash for emergencies, but pay daily costs in dong drawn from an ATM.
• Rules, fees and checkpoint lists change without much warning. Confirm everything on evisa.gov.vn before you pay.

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Sort the visa in the first week of planning. It is the cheapest part of a Vietnam trip and the only part that can stop you at the gate.