Travel The World Like A Local
Travel The World Like A Local

Travel Visas

Visa Travel Advices

What’s on this page?

Find here some useful tips and advice when travelling around the world to help you getting the right visa, the easy way.

Travel Visa Advice page content:

Visa Requirements Around The World

In most of the countries you will be able to get the visa on arrival so no hassle. Otherwise, for the countries you need to apply first, just doing it in your previous country is early enough. As it would (should?) be a border country, there are quite a few people applying and getting visas, it works well. There is no need to apply long time before entering, or almost never.

Where do you need visas?

Check for Europeans and for United States citizens:

For other nationalities, you can search on google, Wikipedia would have a page for it 😊.

These 2 non-official links are a good start to give you all the information you need about visas:

  • Project Visa
  • Visa Mapper (not as complete but the mapping gives you a good overview – the site is currently down but I let it here because it might come back 😉)
  • Travelscope (another interactive map, while Visa Mapper is down…)

Visa Costs Around The World

As the Visa Requirements show it, quite a few countries let you in for free and 90 days, which is perfect and enough to visit a country, taking your time. South America is convenient for that, see the Visa Regions Tips.

In other part of the world, visa can cost you money and only let you in for 30 days, making you pay again to extend it if you want to stay longer (30 days go very fast). You will do many of these countries obviously but think about it if you are on a budget. Should you take more of your time and enjoy countries you can visit for free and for few months or rush and pay other countries?

It is hard to do a list of the costs as it varies a lot and depends on your country of origin so I don’t want to give you an information that might be outdated soon. Check the official embassy websites for fees information.

Nb: Most of the visas have to be paid in $ or € and in cash so plan your money for that, that can be annoying not to have that cash on you entering a country. Read the Travel Money Advice section.

Common Visa Vs Visa On Arrival

More and more, it is easy to get a visa on arrival but you might still consider applying for it before (the common way), as it is sometimes a way to get longer visa than the ones delivered on arrival. For example, I got the 2 months visa for Thailand for not much instead of getting now only 15 days if entering/crossing border by land. Same thing for India, where you can quite easily get a 6 months visa if applied before, comparing to the 30 days you can get on arrival. 30 days is not much for India so…

Visa Agencies

I wouldn’t advise to use any kind of middle man for visas. It is not rocket science to do it yourself and it is part of the trip, there is always a way to do it yourself. Don’t pay for it!

They make it hard so you get tempted to use these commercial agencies. If you are not sure, go on Internet and read the official websites as forums, plenty of travellers discussing visa issues, you will find everything there!

An exception here might be if you are somewhere and have to travel far to get a visa situation fixed. If dealing with the situation takes time and money, then considering an agency to do the return trip for you could be convenient. So you can carry on enjoying wherever you are.

Way Out / Onward Ticket Required

In practice, and even more if you travel overland, you are rarely bothered about showing proof of onward ticket.

It happens more when flying (the airline checking it because they are responsible too) and more flying in islands (Caribbean, pacific islands).

Try to get some information to see if a country check that or not, ask travellers, etc. If they do, then it is better to prepare something to show them, everyone would be happy and hop you go.

Sometimes you can get around with a simple bus ticket leaving the country (that you can then cancel or get refunded), or an hotel booking in the capital of the next country (same thing, using booking.com for example and cancelling the booking after entering the country).

If they seem stricter than that, here is a better trick to get around:

Book, cancel and get full refund: quite a few travel agencies (Expedia, etc.) give you 24h to get a full refund if you change your mind. So you can book the normal way, just before flying and cancel your booking just after landing.

Book and pay later: book a flight ticket on these airline companies that allow you to pay later (usually 24h pre-booking thing) and print the pre-booking email they send you. Some of these booking emails are proper reservation confirmation (cf Cathay Pacific airline). You might just want to edit and delete the first line (mentioning it is only a pre-booking) before printing the email.

Don’t worry too much about that as the reservation booking (just booking, not paying for it) is the way agencies do when getting a visa for their clients. The only difference, they will charge you for that.

No one will actually check your booking with the airline company, they just won’t.

If you don’t find the airline that let you that, you can use the website OneWayFly, they give you a “valid” ticket available for 14 days, but you pay a reservation fee for it, like 19€ or so (still better than a real ticket or not having any when required),

World Regions Tips

  • Asia:

Most of the countries require visas and they usually give you 1 month only. Visa costs would be from 30$ to 50$ in average, same fees again (or more) for extending the visa.

Malaysia gives you 90 days for free and Kuala Lumpur is a good flying hub so you might plan to freely pass by this one few times while in Asia.

  • South / Central America:

For most nationalities South America would be cheaper than in Asia (if not free). You should get 90 days for free for most of them. More time, no costs, less hassle, ideal area of the world to travel (visa wise at least).

  • Africa:

Most of the countries of West Africa require visas prior to arrival.

Southern and Eastern Africa deliver more visas on arrival.

Visas could be quite expensive for some countries so check first (Eg: Mozambique, Malawi, Angola, Uganda, Burkina Faso, etc.)