India sends more visitors to Sri Lanka than any other country, and every one of them needs an ETA approved before boarding. The government charge is waived for Indian passports, the stay is 30 days, and two entries are allowed.
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
Important for Indian citizens
Indian passports are covered by the waiver in force since 25 May 2026, so Sri Lanka collects no government charge on a tourist ETA. The authorisation is still compulsory and must be approved before you travel.
Overview
No country is closer to Sri Lanka than India, and none sends more travellers. The flight from Chennai is shorter than most domestic hops, the clocks do not change when you land, and the food, the cricket and the temple calendar all feel half-familiar. That closeness is exactly why the paperwork gets overlooked: people book a long weekend in Colombo or Bentota the way they would book Goa, and only discover at the airline counter that an Electronic Travel Authorisation was expected.
The position for Indian passport holders is simple once it is stated plainly. Sri Lanka requires an ETA from every foreign national, India included, and it has to be in place before you arrive. What changed on 25 May 2026 is the cost on the Sri Lankan side: India is one of 40 countries whose tourist ETA no longer carries a government charge. Many Indian travellers call the document a Sri Lanka visa or an e-visa, and for a short holiday it does the job a visa would.
This page is written for travellers leaving from India or holding an Indian passport abroad. It covers how the 30-day stay and the two entries work on a trip that might also take in the Maldives, how names on Indian passports should be entered, which Indian cities have the best connections, and how the Indian holiday calendar lines up with the two Sri Lankan monsoons.
At a glance
Eligibility
Yes, Indian citizens need an ETA for Sri Lanka, whether the trip is a honeymoon in Bentota, a Ramayana trail pilgrimage, a family visit to Jaffna or three days at the Colombo casinos. News coverage in India has often described the waiver as visa-free travel, which is where the confusion starts. The charge was removed; the requirement was not, and airlines flying out of Indian airports check for the approval at the counter.
A tourist ETA covers what most Indian visitors go for: holidays and sightseeing, visiting friends and relatives, Ayurveda and yoga stays, cultural performances, and taking part in sporting events. Travelling to watch India play at the R. Premadasa Stadium or in Pallekele is ordinary tourism and sits comfortably within it.
Corporate travel is a different matter, and India sends a great deal of it. Company offsites, dealer conferences, trade meetings, seminars and short training programmes fall under the business option rather than the tourist one, even when the agenda includes a day at the beach. If your employer is paying for a meeting in Colombo, pick the business ETA when you start the application on this page.
Indian citizens who live in the Gulf, the United Kingdom, Singapore or North America apply exactly as they would from Mumbai or Delhi, because the waiver follows the passport and not the country of residence. The reverse is also true. An Overseas Citizen of India card is not a travel document, so an OCI holder applies under the nationality of the foreign passport they actually carry, and the charge that applies is the one set for that country.
Stay & validity
A tourist ETA gives Indian visitors 30 days in Sri Lanka, counted from the day of first arrival, with two entries inside that period. The double entry is useful for a pattern Indian travellers favour: a few days in Colombo and the south, a hop to Malé, then back through Colombo on the way home. On the second arrival you receive only what is left of the original 30 days, so a return on day 20 leaves ten.
Once approved, the ETA can be used to travel at any point in the following six months. That suits Indian booking habits well, since fares for Diwali week and the December holidays are usually bought months ahead. Apply when the flights are confirmed, keep the approval email, and check that the conditions printed on it match what you expect.
Sri Lanka asks for six months of passport validity on the day you land. Adult Indian passports run for ten years and are easy to lose track of; a minor's passport lasts five years or until the child turns 18, whichever is sooner, and those are the ones that most often fall short. If a renewal at the Passport Seva Kendra is due, do it before applying, because the ETA is tied to the passport number and a reissued booklet carries a new one.
Thirty days is rarely a constraint for Indian holidaymakers, but students, yoga trainees and people visiting relatives sometimes want longer. Anything beyond the initial period needs an extension from the Department of Immigration and Emigration at Battaramulla, just outside Colombo, arranged before the first 30 days run out. Crossing back to Chennai and returning repeatedly is not a substitute, since a tourist ETA does not allow someone to live in Sri Lanka through successive visits.
Pricing
Live fees for Indian 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 India
Requirements
Everything Indian 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.
Applications from Indian passport holders are generally straightforward, and most approvals come back within a day or two. Nothing in that is a promise, and a short flight does not mean a short lead time: apply at least three to five days before departure so that a query or a correction does not collide with a non-refundable fare.
Volumes from India climb sharply around a few fixed points. The Diwali break, the last ten days of December, the summer vacation from April to June and any long weekend created by a Friday or Monday holiday all bring a rush of late bookings. During those weeks, give yourself a full week or more, particularly for a wedding party or a group tour where one missing approval holds up everyone.
Groups deserve their own planning. Indian destination weddings in Bentota and Colombo, school excursions and incentive trips can involve dozens of passports, and up to ten travellers can be placed on one application. Collect clear bio-page images from every guest early, check each passport's expiry date yourself, and submit in batches so that one unreadable scan does not delay the rest.
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
India has more air links to Colombo than any other country, with SriLankan Airlines, IndiGo and Air India between them connecting the island to the metros and to a string of southern cities. Departures from Chennai, Bengaluru and Kochi are short enough to make a weekend trip practical, while travellers from the north usually fly from Delhi or connect through Mumbai or Chennai. Jaffna has its own regional service from Chennai, which is the quickest way into the Northern Province.
Best time to go
India and Sri Lanka keep the same time, UTC+5:30, all year. There is no jet lag, a morning departure from Chennai has you at the hotel by lunch, and calls home need no arithmetic. It also means the practical question for Indian travellers is never the journey but the weather, which differs sharply between the island's two coasts.
The classic season for Colombo, Bentota, Galle, Mirissa and the hill country runs from December to March. That fits the Christmas and New Year break, Pongal and the Republic Day long weekend, and it is when whale-watching boats leave Mirissa and the tea estates around Nuwara Eliya are at their clearest. It is also the most expensive period, so book early.
The Indian summer vacation is trickier. April is still pleasant in the south-west, though Sinhala and Tamil New Year in the middle of the month closes many shops and restaurants for several days, much as Puthandu and Vishu do at home. From May the south-west monsoon arrives, the same system that reaches Kerala a little later, and families travelling in May and June do better on the east coast at Trincomalee, Pasikudah or Arugam Bay, which stay dry until September.
Diwali usually falls in the inter-monsoon weeks of October or November, when showers are possible anywhere but rarely last all day. Pilgrims on the Ramayana trail, visiting Seetha Amman Temple near Nuwara Eliya, Munneswaram and Koneswaram at Trincomalee, travel year-round. One date to check before you book: every full-moon Poya day is a public holiday on which alcohol is not sold, which matters if you are planning a celebration.
Avoid these
Problems are rare, and almost always technical rather than substantive. These are the ones that come up most often on applications from India — worth a minute now rather than a new application later.
Indian travel headlines announced that Sri Lanka had gone visa-free, and plenty of travellers took that literally. Only the government charge was removed for Indian passports. An approved ETA is still expected, and passengers at Chennai or Bengaluru without one can be refused boarding.
Many passports issued in Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh carry a single name, a blank surname line or a father's name expanded from an initial. Applicants often rearrange these to look like a first name and last name. Enter each field exactly as the passport prints it, even if your Aadhaar card or flight ticket shows something else.
Indian banks issue most debit and credit cards with international online transactions disabled until the customer turns them on. A declined payment at the last step is nearly always this setting, not a problem with the application. Enable international use in your banking app and set a sensible limit before you begin.
People of Indian origin who now hold British, American, Canadian or other citizenship sometimes select India out of habit, or because they carry an OCI card. The ETA must match the passport presented in Colombo. Choose the nationality printed on that passport and check the price shown for it.
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 is represented in India by its High Commission in New Delhi, a Deputy High Commission in Chennai and a Consulate General in Mumbai. None of them needs to see an Indian tourist applying for an ETA: the application is made online and the approval is sent by email. The missions are the place to go for matters the ETA does not cover, such as longer stays, work, study or journalism.
FAQs
The questions Indian passport holders ask most often about travelling to Sri Lanka.
Yes, in the sense that Indian citizens must hold an approved Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA) before arriving in Sri Lanka. It is the document most people mean when they say Sri Lanka visa. For a tourist trip it allows 30 days and two entries, and Sri Lanka does not levy a government charge on it for Indian passports.
Not quite. Since 25 May 2026 the Sri Lankan government charge on a tourist ETA has been waived for Indian passport holders, but the ETA itself remains mandatory. A service fee for our application assistance applies, and the live prices shown on this page set out what you pay.
Thirty days from the date of first arrival. Two entries are permitted within that period, so you can leave for the Maldives and return, but the second entry is granted only the days remaining. A longer stay needs an extension from the Department of Immigration and Emigration in Battaramulla.
No. Sri Lanka accepts only a passport from Indian visitors, and the ETA is recorded against the passport number. Aadhaar, PAN and voter identity cards are not travel documents for this journey, unlike the arrangements Indians are used to for Nepal and Bhutan.
Follow the passport exactly. If the surname line is empty and your full name sits under given names, enter it that way and do not invent a split. If your name appears as an expanded initial followed by your own name, copy that order. The entry should mirror the machine-readable lines at the foot of the bio-data page.
The payment is taken by international card, so UPI apps and domestic-only RuPay cards will not go through. Use a Visa or Mastercard debit or credit card and make sure international online transactions are enabled with your bank before you start.
Yes. Every child, including an infant, travels on their own passport and must be included in an ETA application. Sri Lanka does not charge a government fee for children under 12 on a tourist stay of up to 30 days, and Indian passports of any age benefit from the waiver in any case.
Yes. The application is online and can be completed from anywhere. What counts is your Indian passport, not your UAE residence, so the same waiver and the same 30-day, double-entry terms apply. Make sure the passport has six months left on the day you land in Colombo.
Your nationality is already set to India. 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.
