The Invisible
Visa

The story

Australia has long asked almost every visitor for a visa; in the 1990s the only exceptions were New Zealand citizens and the British Royal family. With more and more tourists flying in, in September 1996 it began issuing the Electronic Travel Authority: a visa with no label and no stamp, held in a government computer and linked to the passport number.

No label, no stamp: the visa became a line in a computer.

Issuing moved from about 85 embassies and consulates to more than 20,000 travel agents and airline desks, and the visa was granted within seconds. Within a few years about three in four Australian tourist visas were ETAs. It is often called the world's first system of its kind, and it became the model for the permits that followed.

Today it lives in an app. Since February 2022 the AustralianETA app has been the only way to apply: you scan your passport, take a live photo of your face and usually get an answer straight away.

The story

In April 2006 Cambodia began issuing tourist visas online, one of the first countries to do so and a decade after Australia's electronic authority. Instead of queuing in the arrival hall with a passport photo and dollars in hand, a traveller could apply on a website and land with the approval already printed.

Most e-Visas only get dearer. Cambodia's went the other way.

Most e-Visas only ever get dearer. Cambodia's went the other way: since 1 January 2025 the tourist e-Visa costs US$30 all in, down from US$36, and the business e-Visa fell from US$42 to US$35. The same reform joined the e-Visa to the free e-Arrival card, the online form that replaced the paper arrival card at the airports.

The story

Before 2009, visitors from Visa Waiver countries filled in a green paper form on the plane. A 2007 law, passed to carry out the 9/11 Commission's recommendations, replaced it with the Electronic System for Travel Authorization. Applications opened on 1 August 2008, and from 12 January 2009 no Visa Waiver traveller could fly to the US without one.

Free in 2008. US$40.62 in 2026.

It was free at first. A US$14 fee arrived in September 2010, US$21 in May 2022 and US$40 on 30 September 2025. Since then the fee rises with inflation each year: US$40.27 in January 2026 and US$40.62 from 16 October 2026. If you are refused, you still pay US$10.62 of it.

The form still asks, among other things, whether you have ever engaged in terrorist activities, espionage, sabotage or genocide. It now asks for a selfie, too, and a December 2025 proposal would make five years of social media history compulsory; as of October 2026 that had not come into force.

The story

Sri Lanka tried out its Electronic Travel Authorization from October 2011 and made it compulsory on 1 January 2012, in place of the visa on arrival most visitors had used. For twelve years a tourist paid online and flew in with an approval linked to their passport.

The price doubled overnight, and a court put it back.

In April 2024 the system was handed to a private consortium that included VFS Global, and the cost to travellers roughly doubled, to about US$100. After an outcry the US$50 visa was restored in May, and on 2 August 2024 the Supreme Court suspended the deal and ordered the old ETA system back into use.

Then, on 25 May 2026, Sri Lanka made the tourist ETA free for citizens of forty countries, from Australia, China and India to the United Kingdom and the United States. They still have to apply; they just pay nothing. Everyone else pays US$50, and children under 12 travel free.

The story

Canada opened its Electronic Travel Authorization on 1 August 2015 and made it compulsory for visa-free visitors flying in from 15 March 2016, with a period of leniency until November that year. It costs CAD 7, the same as on the first day.

CAD 7, the same as on the day it opened.

Most applications never meet a person: 85 to 90 per cent are approved automatically, usually within minutes, and Canada approved 3,371,700 of them in 2025. The rest get an email within 72 hours asking for more.

It only applies to air travel. Drive over from the US, or arrive by train, bus or boat, and you do not need one, with one new exception: since 5 June 2026 most visa-free visitors arriving by ferry from the French islands of Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon need an eTA too, after some travellers used the crossing to avoid the checks.

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Vietnam began issuing e-Visas on 1 February 2017, as a pilot for citizens of 40 countries: 30 days, one entry and a fee of US$25.

Three times the stay, for the same US$25.

On 15 August 2023 it opened the e-Visa to every nationality and tripled the longest stay to 90 days, with single or multiple entries. The single-entry fee stayed at US$25. At the same time a growing list of countries, many of them in Europe, can now visit for up to 45 days with no visa at all.

Visitors came. In 2025 Vietnam counted a record 21.2 million international arrivals.

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For decades Saudi Arabia issued visas for work, business, family visits and pilgrimage, and almost none for tourism. On 27 September 2019, at a ceremony in Diriyah, the old capital whose At-Turaif district is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, it announced a tourist e-Visa for citizens of 49 countries. Applications opened the next day.

The door opened at a ceremony. The key was a web form.

The rules for visitors changed with it: foreign women were told they did not have to wear an abaya, only to dress modestly. The e-Visa is valid for a year with multiple entries, and health insurance is part of the price.

Visitors came. The kingdom counted 29.3 million international visitors in 2025, pilgrims included, and its target for 2030 is 150 million visits a year, 70 million of them from abroad.

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New Zealand introduced its Electronic Travel Authority in August 2019 and required it from 1 October that year, for visitors from visa-waiver countries, cruise passengers and most transit passengers. Australians do not need one. Within a month, more than 99 per cent were being processed automatically.

NZD 17 for the permit, NZD 100 for the country.

With it came the International Visitor Conservation and Tourism Levy. It started at NZD 35 and rose to NZD 100 on 1 October 2024, about six times the price of the NZeTA itself when you apply in the app.

The levy pays for tourism infrastructure and for conservation. The 2026/27 plan sets aside NZD 55 million for nature, including NZD 10 million to clear invasive wilding pines and NZD 500,000 for more habitat for the kākāpō, the flightless parrot of which only a few hundred are left.

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South Korea tried the K-ETA from May 2021 and made it compulsory for visa-free visitors on 1 September 2021. It costs KRW 10,000, needs a face photo, and is applied for only on the official website or app.

Some travellers pay for a permit they don't need, to skip a paper form.

To bring tourists back after the pandemic, Korea exempted visitors from 22 countries and regions from 1 April 2023, for its Visit Korea Year. The exemption was extended to the end of 2025, and then to 31 December 2026.

Thailand was not on the list, and refusals of Thai travellers set off an online boycott: Thai arrivals fell by about a fifth in early 2024. Meanwhile some exempt travellers buy a K-ETA anyway, because it lets them skip the paper arrival card.

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Indonesia's visa on arrival used to mean a queue at the airport with cash in hand. In November 2022, just before world leaders flew into Bali for the G20 summit, the country launched the e-VOA: the same visa, bought online before you travel, so you reach the immigration desk with the approval already on your phone.

The visa on arrival, bought before you leave home.

Bali then added a charge of its own. Since 14 February 2024 foreign visitors to the island have paid a tourist levy of IDR 150,000, about US$9, through the Love Bali system. It is separate from the visa, and the island says it pays for its culture and environment.

In October 2025 the last paper forms went too. Every arrival, babies included, now fills in the free All Indonesia card online, which replaced the separate health and customs declarations.

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The UK started small. From 15 November 2023 citizens of Qatar needed an Electronic Travel Authorisation, and the British ambassador said they would be the first in the world to benefit. Six more Gulf states followed in February 2024, most of the rest of the visa-free world in January 2025, and Europeans on 2 April 2025.

23.2 million ETAs in a year, against 2.2 million visas.

For some it was a bargain: Gulf visitors had paid £30 for a single-use visa waiver, and the ETA cost £10. The price has since doubled, to £16 in April 2025 and £20 in April 2026. From 25 February 2026 the rule became 'no permission, no travel': airlines check for an ETA before you board.

In the year to June 2026 the UK granted 23.2 million ETAs, against 2.2 million visitor visas. Americans led with 4.5 million, then Germans and French.

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On 12 December 2023 President William Ruto announced that from January 2024 no visitor would need a visa for Kenya. The catch came with it: every traveller, including citizens of African countries that had never needed a visa, now had to apply online for an Electronic Travel Authorisation costing US$30.

Visa-free, said the announcement. US$30, said the website.

Critics called it a visa by another name. In 2025 Kenya exempted almost all African nationals, except those of Libya and Somalia, along with some Caribbean states.

And from 5 October 2026, visitors who need an eTA also have to buy Kenyan government travel health insurance as part of the application.

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For as long as most travellers can remember, a visit to Europe began and ended with a stamp: an officer inked the date into your passport and counted the days by hand. On 12 October 2025 the EU began replacing the stamps with the Entry/Exit System, which records a non-EU visitor's face and fingerprints the first time they cross and then logs every entry and exit.

No more stamps: your face is the record now.

By 10 April 2026 it was running at the external borders of all 29 countries that use it. Registering takes about 70 seconds a traveller, the European Commission said, and by then the system had logged more than 52 million crossings and refused entry to more than 27,000 people. The busy summer that followed brought long queues at some ports and airports.

The system also counts the 90 days in any 180 that a short-stay visitor may spend in the area, so an overstay shows up at once. In Cyprus and Ireland, outside the system, passports are still stamped by hand.

The story

ETIAS is Europe's answer to ESTA: an online permit, linked to your passport, for visitors who do not need a visa. The law creating it came into force in October 2018, and the EU agency building it said it would be working by the end of 2021.

Five start dates so far, and the board still says delayed.

The date slipped to the end of 2022, then to 2023, to spring 2025 and, in March 2025, to the last quarter of 2026. ETIAS can only start once the Entry/Exit System is running, and that took until 2026. Along the way the fee went up from €7 to €20.

In August 2026 the official site changed its wording: ETIAS is not in operation, and the start date will be announced several months before launch. Even then, there will be at least six months when travellers without one are not turned away, and six more of grace for those visiting for the first time.

The story

Japan lets visitors from 74 countries and regions in without a visa, and record numbers have come. To check them before they fly, its parliament amended the immigration law on 29 May 2026 to create JESTA, to begin in the 2028 fiscal year.

The next row on the board, due in 2028.

Travellers will give their name, the purpose of the trip and where they will stay a few days before departure. Anyone suspected of planning to work illegally or overstay can be stopped before boarding.

One small change follows: with JESTA, some visitors will no longer get a landing stamp in their passport, so Japan is redesigning how tax-free shops check who can shop tax-free. The fee will be set later; reports say ¥2,000 to ¥3,000 is being considered.