Nepal visa on arrival: $50 in clean USD beats the card terminal

Quick summary

Nepal’s visa on arrival is priced in US dollars: $30 for 15 days, $50 for 30 days and $125 for 90 days, listed as multiple-entry and up from the older $25/$40/$100 schedule. Card terminals at Kathmandu exist but fail often, so clean, near-exact USD notes clear the counter fastest. The e-visa, live since 17 August 2026, is the card-payment route.

Land borders take cash only, and worn bills can be refused. This guide covers the fee tiers, what to carry, where the visa is issued, and what extensions and overstays cost.

Nepal’s full electronic visa system went live on 17 August 2026. A little under two months later, it runs alongside, not in place of, the paper-and-cash counter at Tribhuvan International Airport. For travelers from North America, Europe and Australia, that leaves three routes to the same sticker in a passport: apply and pay online before flying, pay by card at a Kathmandu terminal, or hand US dollar notes across the counter. The fee is identical on all three.

A 30-day visa is the practical default for most two- to three-week itineraries.

The question is which payment route holds up on a bad night at the airport. A card terminal is only useful when it works.

What Nepal’s visa on arrival costs

Nepal prices the tourist visa in US dollars, so officers at the airport can process a dollar payment without consulting a rate board. Nepal’s Department of Immigration schedule, updated in mid-2026, lists $50 USD for a 30-day visa. The other tiers are $30 for 15 days and $125 for 90 days, all listed as multiple-entry. The Department of Immigration’s visa-on-arrival page carries the current figures.

The previous tiers were $25, $40 and $100. Anyone working from a pre-2026 blog will arrive with the wrong amount in hand.

A dollar payment removes the conversion and the guesswork. The officer counts the bills, stamps the passport, and the transaction ends. Euros, pounds, Australian dollars and several other currencies are accepted at posted rates, but each adds a conversion to a fee fixed in dollars.

Two details decide whether your notes pass. The counter may hold no change, and worn, torn, folded or marked notes can be refused outright.

How Nepal’s e-visa fits alongside visa on arrival

The e-visa moves the application and card payment to before departure. The counter at Tribhuvan International still handles most arrivals.

It is the only route on which the money leaves your account before you reach Asia. That is the point. A traveler landing at 11 p.m. after a connection, with no dollars in a bag, is the case this system was built for, provided the application completes. How the digital switch-over changes each route into Nepal sets out which option fits which traveler.

The visa is still issued at the airport after payment. The e-visa removes the payment step, not the immigration queue.

Before you fly: passport, form and dollar notes

Immigration checks three things before it takes money, and each is easier to fix at home than in an arrivals hall. The passport must meet the validity and blank-page rules. The arrival card must be complete. The fee must be paid in a currency the officer will accept.

Completing the arrival card online produces a barcode to print or keep on a phone. Filing early does not issue the visa, but it removes the paper form and a second queue. A small group of nationalities cannot use visa on arrival, whatever they do online. Those applications start well before departure; which passports have to arrange a visa before boarding explains who must arrange one.

A folded bill rarely fails; a torn one can. Crisp paper saves a negotiation at a counter where you have no leverage.

Where visa on arrival works, and what the counter does

Visa on arrival is issued at Tribhuvan International Airport in Kathmandu, Pokhara International Airport, Gautam Buddha International Airport at Bhairahawa, and at designated land border crossings. Airports take cash. Land borders take cash only.

The sequence is fixed everywhere: complete the arrival card or use an arrivals-hall kiosk, pay the fee, collect the visa, then join the immigration queue. Payment comes first. A traveler who reaches immigration without a visa is sent back to the counter and starts again.

Some Kathmandu counters now carry card terminals, and Nepal’s tourism authority lists international credit cards among accepted payment methods. But the terminals are often unreliable or offline. The network is the weak point: a terminal that cannot reach its bank does nothing for passengers from several long-haul arrivals landing within the same hour.

When the card terminal fails, and extensions

A terminal that drops mid-transaction is the worst outcome at the counter. The officer sees no confirmed payment, your bank may show a pending charge, and you pay twice before the first one clears. Airport ATMs are a poor substitute. They are often out of order or refuse international cards.

Staying longer is a separate calculation, handled at immigration offices in Kathmandu and Pokhara rather than at the airport. Tourist stays are capped at 150 days per calendar year, counted from a visa year that resets on 1 January.

The published tiers only look expensive next to extending.

For a 45-day trip, one extension costs $30 less than buying the 90-day tier outright. The Nepal Tourism Board’s tourist visa page lists the tiers and extension limits.

Overstaying is the most expensive ending of all. Under the short-overstay process, it carries a reported $3 per day extension charge plus a $5 per day fine.

Where your departure point changes the maths

Your departure point does not change the fee or the passport rules. It changes which currency you can hand over without a conversion, and what a card is worth as a backup.

North America. US and Canadian passports are among those eligible for visa on arrival. If you apply in advance instead, Nepal’s embassy listings price those applications in local money: CAD 45, 70 and 180 in Ottawa. Those amounts cover 15, 30 and 90 days, respectively.

Europe, including the UK. The counter’s posted rates determine the conversion for euros and pounds. British government guidance recommends carrying cash as a backup to a card, which matches what travelers passing through Kathmandu describe about terminals.

Australia and New Zealand. Advance applications at Nepal’s embassy in Canberra are listed at AUD 50, 80 and 200. Those amounts cover 15, 30 and 90 days, respectively.

Start 15 days out, not at the airport

The fortnight before travel is the right window to settle the money and the documents. Draw the exact fee at a bank before flying, and ask for clean, unfolded notes with no pen marks.

• File the arrival form as soon as the 15-day window opens, then print the barcode or save it offline; the arrivals hall is the wrong place to discover a dead battery.
• Audit the passport for six months of validity beyond arrival and one blank page, because a renewal takes weeks that a departure date will not wait for.
• Match the visa tier to the itinerary rather than to habit, and remember the calendar-year cap if a second long trip falls in the same year.
• Watch: the e-visa is still new, so check the Department of Immigration’s page in the week before departure for changes to the arrival steps.

Anything left to the arrivals hall costs a queue, a conversation in a second language, and a stop at whichever exchange counter is open. Settling it at home costs an envelope and a ten-minute errand.

Questions? Answers.