Austrian passport holders can apply for the Indian eVisa entirely online — no appointment at the Embassy of India in Vienna, no courier, no passport handed over. Approval typically arrives by email in 24 to 72 hours.
90 days
Maximum stay per visit
24–72 hrs
Typical processing time
Up to 5 years
Longest validity offered
Not eligible
Visa on Arrival
100% online
No embassy visit
Overview
Austria sends a disproportionate number of travellers to India for its size, and the pattern leans towards the deliberate end of the market: Himalayan trekking, extended yoga and Ayurveda stays, and cultural itineraries through Rajasthan and the south. Vienna also has a long-standing nonstop link to Delhi, which makes access easier than for most countries of nine million people.
Every Austrian citizen needs a visa granted before departure. There is no visa-free entry and no visa on arrival. For tourism, business and medical travel the eVisa handles it entirely online: an electronic authorisation issued by the Government of India, linked to your passport number, with no stamp and no consular appointment.
Austrian passport holders receive up to 90 days per visit on the tourist eVisa, and the five-year multiple-entry version is available. Ninety days comfortably covers the long Ayurveda programmes and multi-region itineraries that Austrian travellers tend to plan.
At a glance
Eligibility
Yes. India extends visa-free entry only to Nepal and Bhutan, and Visa on Arrival only to Japanese, South Korean and Emirati nationals. Austrian citizens must hold an approved visa before boarding, and Austrian Airlines or your carrier will verify it at the gate in Vienna.
Choose the category by purpose. Tourism, trekking, sightseeing, visiting friends, and yoga or Ayurveda retreats fall under the tourist eVisa. Business meetings, trade fairs, supplier audits and technical discussions require the business eVisa. Treatment at an Indian hospital requires the medical eVisa. Employment, journalism, academic research and long-term study are outside the eVisa scheme and need a regular visa from the embassy in Vienna.
A wellness or Ayurveda retreat is tourism, and the tourist eVisa is correct for it. The medical eVisa is a different product entirely, requiring a letter from a hospital on India's recognised list — a resort or spa cannot provide one.
Stay & validity
Austrian citizens are permitted up to 90 days per visit on the tourist eVisa. The 30-day version allows double entry, with its 30 days counted from your arrival date rather than the grant date. The one-year and five-year versions are multiple-entry, and their validity begins on the date the Indian government approves the application.
That grant-date rule matters given how far ahead Austrian travellers typically book. Applying in April for a November trip spends seven months of a one-year eVisa before you leave Vienna. For a one-year visa, apply two to three weeks before departure.
One point specific to the Austrian trekking market: the eVisa does not grant access to Protected or Restricted Areas. Parts of Ladakh, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and Mizoram need a Protected Area Permit or Restricted Area Permit in addition to your visa, arranged inside India and usually through a licensed operator.
The business eVisa allows up to 180 days per visit within a one-year multiple-entry window — double the tourist allowance. The medical eVisa gives 60 days from first entry with triple entry.
Pricing
Live government fees and service charges for Austrian passport holders, shown all-in — nothing further is charged later.
Your nationality is pre-selected as Austria
Requirements
Everything Austrian passport holders need before starting an application. The first five items apply to every applicant; the rest are specific to your nationality or visa type.
Passport bio-data page — a clear colour scan or photo showing your photograph, full name, date of birth, passport number and expiry date
Recent passport-style photograph — square format, plain white background, full face visible, no shadows and no headwear other than for religious reasons
A valid credit or debit card to pay the government fee and service charge
Your return or onward ticket details, or at minimum your intended departure date
The address where you will be staying for your first night in India
Simple process
Four steps, entirely online, with our team checking every field before anything reaches the Indian authorities.
Enter your passport details exactly as printed, choose your visa type and duration, and upload your photo and passport data page.
Our team checks your photo dimensions, passport scan clarity, name spelling and date formats before anything is submitted.
Your application goes to the Government of India on your behalf, and we keep you posted at every status change.
Print it or keep it on your phone, and we explain exactly how to present it at your port of entry in India.
Standard processing takes 48 to 72 hours and express handling 24 to 48 hours. Both are business-day estimates, and Indian public holidays — numerous and often state-specific — will extend them.
Apply at least a week before departure, ideally two, so a rejected photograph can be replaced without paying twice for express handling. If your trip involves a Protected Area Permit, start that process considerably earlier: permits are arranged inside India and take longer than the visa itself.
Separate from your eVisa, every foreign national entering India must complete the digital e-Arrival Card before boarding. It replaces the old paper disembarkation form and is required on every single visit, whatever visa you hold.
Getting there
Vienna has nonstop service to Delhi with Austrian Airlines, and Delhi is a designated eVisa port. From Salzburg, Graz, Linz or Innsbruck you will connect via Vienna, Frankfurt, Munich or a Gulf hub, none of which affects your eVisa.
Best time to go
October to March is India's dry season and the best window for the classic circuits. The Christmas and New Year weeks are the fare peak out of Vienna; February and March offer the same weather with better availability and lower prices.
For the Austrian trekking market the calendar inverts. The high Himalaya — Ladakh, Zanskar and Spiti — is only genuinely accessible from June to September, which is exactly when the plains are unbearable and the monsoon covers most of the country. Those regions sit in the rain shadow, so the Austrian summer holidays are the right time for them.
Avoid the northern plains in May and June, when temperatures exceed 45°C. India is 3.5 to 4.5 hours ahead of Austrian time depending on the season, so jet lag on an 8-hour nonstop is mild — most travellers are functional the following morning.
Avoid these
Refusals are rare, and almost always technical rather than substantive. These are the problems that come up most often on applications from Austria — we check for every one of them before submitting.
The most consequential error for Austrian travellers, given how much of this market is trekking. An eVisa does not grant access to Protected or Restricted Areas. Parts of Ladakh, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and Mizoram need a separate permit arranged inside India. Sort it through your Indian operator well before you travel.
Your passport's machine-readable zone renders Müller as MUELLER, Schröder as SCHROEDER and Weiß as WEISS, while the printed name line shows the umlaut form. Match the printed line and keep your airline booking consistent with it — three variants of one name across visa, ticket and passport is what triggers questions at check-in.
Austrian citizens receive 90 days per visit, not the 180 days granted to American, British, Canadian and Japanese nationals. Much of the English-language guidance is written for those markets, and the eVisa cannot be extended from inside India.
A wellness or Ayurveda retreat is tourism, and the tourist eVisa is correct. The medical eVisa requires a letter from a hospital on India's recognised list, which a resort cannot provide. Applying in the wrong category means starting again.
Common when a trek is combined with an Indian cultural leg. The eVisa is valid only at designated airports and authorised seaports — a land crossing from Nepal needs a regular visa from the embassy in Vienna, arranged before you leave.
Photo rejected on technical grounds
By far the most common cause of delay. The photograph must be square, on a plain white background, with your full face visible and no shadow behind your head. Cropped selfies and phone photos taken against a cream wall are routinely bounced back.
Passport scan unreadable
Glare across the machine-readable zone, a cut-off corner, or a scan where the passport number is blurred will stall the application. Photograph the page flat, in daylight, with no flash.
Applying too close to departure
The eVisa must be granted before you fly, and airlines check it at the gate. Applications submitted the night before a flight leave no room for a document re-upload.
Conditions
These conditions are set by the Government of India and do not vary by nationality. They are worth reading before you book, because two of them — the port-of-entry rule and the restricted-areas rule — catch out a lot of otherwise well-planned trips.
Validity is measured from your date of arrival in India, not from the date you apply. You also need at least two blank pages for immigration stamps.
The India eVisa is accepted at India's designated eVisa airports and authorised seaports. It cannot be used to cross a land border, so overland arrivals from Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh or Pakistan need a different visa.
Every person travelling needs their own eVisa and their own passport, including infants and children. Children cannot be added to a parent's application.
An eVisa does not grant access to Protected Areas, Restricted Areas or Cantonment Areas. Parts of Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Mizoram, Sikkim, Ladakh, the Andaman & Nicobar Islands and Lakshadweep require a Protected Area Permit or Restricted Area Permit in addition to your visa.
You cannot extend an eVisa from inside India or convert it into another visa category. If your plans change, you must leave and apply again.
Diplomatic, official and service passports are not eligible for the eVisa route, and neither are international travel documents or refugee travel documents.
Consular services
The embassy in Vienna plays no part in an eVisa application, which is handled entirely online — worth knowing, as it is the only Indian mission in Austria. It covers what the eVisa cannot: employment, journalism, research and long-term student visas, OCI cards, and consular services for Indian nationals in Austria.
FAQs
The questions Austrian passport holders ask most often about applying for an Indian eVisa.
Up to 90 days per visit on the tourist eVisa. The 30-day version allows 30 days with double entry; the one-year and five-year versions are multiple-entry with a 90-day cap per visit. The business eVisa permits up to 180 days per visit within a one-year window, and the medical eVisa 60 days from first entry with triple entry.
Not on its own. The eVisa gets you into India, but Protected and Restricted Areas — including parts of Ladakh, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland and Mizoram — require a separate Protected Area Permit or Restricted Area Permit. These are arranged inside India, usually through a licensed trekking operator, and take longer to obtain than the visa. Start early.
Fees are set by nationality and duration, so the pricing panel on this page loads live figures for Austrian passport holders across all available options. You can compare 30-day, one-year and five-year prices side by side, and the amount shown is the full cost including our service fee.
The tourist eVisa. Wellness retreats, yoga courses and Ayurveda stays at resorts count as tourism, and 90 days comfortably covers even the longer three- and four-week programmes. The medical eVisa is for treatment at a hospital on India's recognised list and requires a letter from that hospital.
Yes — Austrian Airlines flies nonstop from Vienna to Delhi in around eight hours, and Delhi is a designated eVisa airport. From Salzburg, Graz, Linz or Innsbruck you will connect via Vienna, Frankfurt or Munich. For Kerala, a Gulf routing into Kochi or Thiruvananthapuram is often faster than connecting inside India.
No. The eVisa is applied for and issued entirely online, your passport stays with you and there is no appointment to book. The embassy only handles categories the eVisa cannot cover, such as employment, journalism, research and long-term study.
No. Indian Visa on Arrival is limited to Japanese, South Korean and Emirati nationals. Austrian citizens need an approved visa before boarding, and your airline will verify it at the departure gate.
No. The eVisa cannot be extended or converted from inside India. If your itinerary needs longer than 90 days per visit, either split it across two entries on a multiple-entry visa or apply for a regular visa through the embassy in Vienna before you travel.
Your nationality is already set to Austria. Complete the form in under ten minutes, and our team will check every detail before it reaches the Indian authorities.
Other nationalities
Stay limits, fees and requirements differ by passport. Here are the guides for other nationalities.
