Guinean passport holders must have an ETA approved before travelling from Conakry to Colombo. It covers a 30-day tourist stay with two entries, and the whole application is completed online in English.
30 days
Stay on a tourist ETA
Double
Entries permitted
6 months
Passport validity needed
3 options
Tourist, Business, Transit
100% online
No embassy visit
Overview
Guineans know rain, mountains and a tropical coast, so Sri Lanka will feel less foreign than it might to their Sahelian neighbours. The Fouta Djallon highlands have something in common with the tea hills around Ella, and Conakry's humid shoreline with the palm-fringed south-west of the island. What is entirely new is the culture: Buddhist temples, Hindu kovils, colonial forts and a cuisine built on coconut and curry leaf.
A Guinean citizen cannot simply arrive, however. Sri Lanka requires an Electronic Travel Authorisation, the ETA, to be approved beforehand. In everyday speech and in most online searches from Conakry it is called a Sri Lanka visa or e-visa, and for tourism the terms point to the same thing.
This guide is for holders of the passport of the Republic of Guinea, sometimes written Guinea-Conakry to separate it from Guinea-Bissau and Equatorial Guinea. It sets out the conditions of the tourist ETA, the cost category Guinea falls into, the ways of reaching Colombo from Ahmed Sékou Touré International Airport, and the details that Guinean applicants most often get wrong.
At a glance
Eligibility
Yes. Every foreign national needs an ETA for a short visit to Sri Lanka and Guinea has no exemption. The approval should be obtained before you fly, and airline staff in Conakry are entitled to ask for it at check-in.
Guinea belongs to the group charged the standard government rate. Its citizens are not covered by the waiver that has applied to forty countries since 25 May 2026, and the special rates for SAARC members and reciprocal partners do not extend to West Africa. You will see the government charge and our service fee itemised in the live prices shown on this page.
Guinean children below the age of twelve are not charged the government fee for a tourist ETA of up to thirty days. They are not exempt from the ETA itself, so a family from Conakry or Labé adds each child to the application alongside the adults.
Pick the tourist option for a holiday, a stay with relatives, medical or Ayurvedic treatment, or a cultural or sporting event. A Guinean entrepreneur in the mining or import trade who is going for negotiations, or anyone attending a conference or short training, needs the business option. Working, paid or unpaid, is excluded from the tourist ETA.
Stay & validity
The tourist ETA gives a Guinean traveller 30 days, starting when you first pass through immigration, with two entries. If you leave for the Maldives and return, the second entry is admitted for the remainder of the original 30 days and no longer.
After approval a Guinean traveller has six months in which to make the journey. For Guineans, who frequently buy tickets through an agency in Kaloum or from relatives in Europe, that leaves time to settle dates after the ETA is in hand. Always read the conditions on the approval itself, as they take precedence.
The Guinean biometric passport is normally issued for five years, and Sri Lanka will not accept it with less than six months remaining on your arrival date. Renewal in Conakry can be slow, so begin early, and apply for the ETA only with the new booklet, since the authorisation is locked to one passport number.
A longer stay is possible only through an extension granted by the Department of Immigration and Emigration, based at Battaramulla near Colombo. Guinean visitors should not treat back-to-back visits as a substitute for one.
Pricing
Live fees for Guinean passport holders, shown all-in — any government charge that applies to your passport and our service fee together, with nothing added later.
Your nationality is pre-selected as Guinea
Requirements
Everything Guinean passport holders need before starting an application. The first five items apply to every applicant; the rest are specific to your nationality.
Passport valid for at least six months from the date you arrive in Sri Lanka — the same passport you will travel on
A clear image of the passport bio-data page, with every corner visible and no glare over the photograph
A working email address, which is where the approval is sent and which you should be able to open while travelling
A credit or debit card for online payment
Your intended arrival date and an address in Sri Lanka, such as your first hotel
Simple process
Four steps, entirely online, with one form per traveller and a full review before you pay.
Pick the Tourist, Business or Transit option that matches the real purpose of your trip, and add every traveller in your party to the same application.
Give each traveller's details exactly as printed on the passport, plus the intended arrival date and an address in Sri Lanka. Entries are made in English.
Check every name, date and passport number on the review screen before paying. Corrections are simple at this stage and difficult afterwards.
The approval is linked electronically to your passport number. Keep a copy on your phone and a printout with your travel documents for check-in and arrival.
In most cases a Guinean application is approved within one to two days. There is no guaranteed turnaround. The applications that take longest are those where the nationality selected, the name or the passport number has to be queried.
Our advice to travellers from Guinea is to apply at least three to five days ahead, and further ahead for the December to March high season. Internet and power interruptions in Conakry are a practical consideration: give yourself time to upload the passport image and complete payment without rushing.
Guinea keeps Greenwich Mean Time and Sri Lanka is five and a half hours ahead, so the Sri Lankan working day is largely over by early afternoon in Conakry. Guinean public holidays such as 2 October, Tabaski and the end of Ramadan can also delay any step that depends on your bank.
On arrival
An approved ETA gets you on the plane. This is what happens once you land, and how to make the arrival as quick as possible.
Bandaranaike International Airport at Katunayake, about 30 kilometres north of Colombo, handles nearly all international arrivals. Follow the signs to immigration and join the foreign passport queue.
The officer retrieves your ETA from the passport number. Have the approval email to hand as a backup, on paper or saved offline, since airport connectivity is not guaranteed.
You may be asked where you are staying, how long for and when you leave. A hotel confirmation and your return ticket answer all three in a few seconds.
Your passport is endorsed with the date you must leave by. Read it at the counter — that date, not the length of your booking, is what counts if your plans change.
Getting there
There is no nonstop service between Guinea and Sri Lanka, but Conakry is better connected to the east than most capitals in the region. Emirates links Conakry with Dubai, where a same-airline connection reaches Colombo, and Turkish Airlines offers a similar one-stop journey through Istanbul. Royal Air Maroc and Ethiopian Airlines provide further options with two changes. Confirm current timetables, as West African routings are adjusted often.
Best time to go
Conakry is one of the wettest capitals in Africa between June and October. Guineans who want to escape that season should avoid Sri Lanka's south-west, which has its own monsoon from May to September, and head for the east coast: Trincomalee, Pasikudah and Arugam Bay enjoy dry, settled weather at exactly that time.
From December to March the pattern reverses. The harmattan dries out Guinea, and in Sri Lanka the south and west coasts, Galle Fort and the hill country are at their finest. Whale watching from Mirissa runs from November to April, and leopard sightings in Yala are good in the dry months.
The school year in Guinea ends around late June or July, and the long vacation that follows is when most families can travel. July or August also brings the Kandy Esala Perahera, ten nights of drummers, dancers and decorated elephants, which combines well with an east-coast beach stay.
October and November are transitional in Sri Lanka, with inter-monsoon showers almost anywhere on the island, much like the tail of the rains in the Fouta. Prices are lower then. Remember that Sri Lanka observes a Poya holiday every full moon, when alcohol sales stop, and that arriving from Conakry you will be adjusting to a clock five and a half hours ahead.
Avoid these
Problems are rare, and almost always technical rather than substantive. These are the ones that come up most often on applications from Guinea — worth a minute now rather than a new application later.
Four countries carry the word Guinea in their names. Guinean citizens from Conakry must choose plain Guinea, code GN. Guinea-Bissau is GW, Equatorial Guinea is GQ and Papua New Guinea is PG, and an ETA issued under any of those will not match your passport.
A name may be written Diallo on a Guinean passport and Jallow on a relative's Gambian or Sierra Leonean one, and Bah, Ba or Bâ can all refer to the same family. Only the spelling in your own passport matters for the ETA.
Elhadj, Hadja and Thierno are sometimes printed as part of the given names in Guinean passports and sometimes not. Copy what is in the name field and the machine-readable zone, and leave out titles that appear only in daily use.
A passport image that is cut off mid-upload, or a payment interrupted by a power cut in Conakry, can leave the application incomplete without your noticing. Wait for the confirmation screen and the email before assuming it has gone through.
Passport number mistyped
The authorisation attaches to the number you enter. One wrong character produces an ETA that does not match the passport handed over at the counter, and a paid application cannot be edited afterwards.
Passport with under six months left
Sri Lanka expects six months of validity counted from the day you arrive, not the day you apply. A passport that falls short is refused at check-in regardless of the ETA.
The wrong ETA type
Attending meetings or a conference on a tourist ETA is outside its conditions. Choose the option that matches what you will actually do in the country.
Conditions
These conditions are set by Sri Lanka's Department of Immigration and Emigration and do not vary by nationality.
Sri Lanka requires an Electronic Travel Authorisation for short visits by all foreign nationals, and it should be approved before you travel. Even where the government charge is waived, the authorisation itself is still required.
The authorisation is recorded against the passport number you enter. If that passport is lost, replaced or renewed before you travel, the ETA does not move across and a new application is needed.
A tourist ETA allows two entries. The stay period runs from your first arrival, so a second entry is granted only the balance of that period rather than a fresh allowance.
A tourist ETA covers holidays, family visits, medical treatment and cultural or sporting events. Business meetings, conferences and short training need the business option, and a stopover of up to two days uses the transit option.
Immigration officers at the port of entry may ask for a confirmed return or onward ticket and evidence that you can support yourself for the length of your stay.
An approved ETA lets you travel to Sri Lanka. The decision to admit you is made by an immigration officer on arrival, and the conditions printed on your approval govern your stay.
Consular services
Sri Lanka has no embassy in Conakry, and its High Commission in Nairobi is accredited to Guinea. Guinean travellers applying for an ETA deal with neither: the process is online from start to finish. The Nairobi mission is relevant only for matters the ETA does not cover, such as media assignments that need government approval first.
FAQs
The questions Guinean passport holders ask most often about travelling to Sri Lanka.
Yes. Guinean citizens need an ETA, Sri Lanka's Electronic Travel Authorisation, approved before they travel. It is the document most people have in mind when they talk about a tourist visa for Sri Lanka.
Choose Guinea. Guinea-Conakry is an informal name used to distinguish the Republic of Guinea from Guinea-Bissau and Equatorial Guinea, which are different countries with their own passports and country codes.
Thirty days, counted from a Guinean visitor's first arrival on a tourist ETA. Two entries are permitted, but the second must take place within those thirty days and only the remaining time is granted.
No. Guinea is outside the list of forty countries that benefit from the waiver, so the standard rate applies. The exception is a child under twelve on a tourist ETA. Guinean applicants can see the totals in the live prices shown on this page.
Usually yes. Emirates through Dubai and Turkish Airlines through Istanbul both offer a single connection from Guinea, subject to current schedules. Other routings through Casablanca or Addis Ababa add a second change.
No. Guinea is covered by the Sri Lanka High Commission in Nairobi. An ETA does not require you to contact any mission.
Either can be used, but they are treated differently. Belgium is one of the countries whose citizens have the government charge waived, whereas Guinea pays the standard rate. The ETA is valid only with the passport you applied on, so carry that one.
A transit ETA exists for stopovers of up to two days and carries no government charge, but you must be able to show proof of onward travel. Guinean passengers planning to leave the airport between flights should arrange it before departure.
Your nationality is already set to Guinea. Complete the form in around ten minutes, review every detail, and receive your ETA by email.
Other nationalities
Charges, routes and the practical details differ by passport. Here are the guides for other nationalities.
