Kazakhstan is one of the 40 countries whose tourist ETA carries no Sri Lankan government charge. The authorisation is still compulsory, covers 30 days with two entries, and should be approved before you board in Almaty or Astana.
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 Kazakh citizens
Kazakhstan is on Sri Lanka's waiver list: since 25 May 2026 the government charge on a tourist ETA is not collected from Kazakh citizens. The ETA itself remains mandatory, and our service fee still applies.
Overview
Sri Lanka has become one of the winter escapes Kazakhstan talks about most. When Almaty is under snow and Astana is sitting at minus twenty-five, the south coast of the island is dry, warm and reachable in a single flight during the season Air Astana runs its Colombo service.
What has not changed is the paperwork. A Kazakh passport does not let you walk into Sri Lanka unannounced: you need an Electronic Travel Authorisation, the document most people in Kazakhstan simply call a Sri Lanka visa or e-visa, and it should be in place before departure. The difference for Kazakhstan is on the cost side, because the country was included when Sri Lanka stopped collecting its government charge from 40 nationalities.
This page is written for travellers holding the blue Kazakh passport. It covers what the waiver does and does not mean, how the 30 days are counted, the name and number fields that trip up Kazakh applicants, and the flights that make sense from each part of the country.
At a glance
Eligibility
Yes. Kazakh citizens need an approved ETA for any short visit to Sri Lanka, and the waiver introduced on 25 May 2026 did not remove that obligation. What it removed is the government charge on the tourist authorisation for Kazakhstan and 39 other countries.
Because of that, be careful with the word free. Sri Lanka no longer collects its own charge from Kazakh tourists, but our application assistance carries a service fee, and the live prices shown on this page are the ones that apply to you. Package buyers should also ask their agency in writing whether the ETA has been arranged, since some tours include it and others leave it to the client.
The tourist option fits what most Kazakh visitors actually do: beach holidays at Bentota or Mirissa, the train through tea country, safaris, surf camps, Ayurveda and yoga retreats, or a stay with friends. If you are flying in to negotiate a contract, attend a conference or run a short training session, the business option is the correct one instead.
Children are not exempt from the authorisation itself. Families from Kazakhstan often travel in large groups over the New Year break, and every child, including a baby on a parent's lap, needs to be included with details taken from the child's own passport.
Stay & validity
A tourist ETA gives Kazakh citizens 30 days in Sri Lanka and permits two entries. The count starts on the day you first land, not on the day the approval arrives in your inbox, and both entries have to fall inside that same 30-day window.
The approval can be used to travel at any point in the six months after it is issued, which suits the way Kazakh holidays are sold: many families lock in a January tour during the autumn early-booking campaigns. Applying in October for a January trip is fine, provided the passport details do not change in between.
Kazakh passports are issued for ten years, so validity problems are rarer here than in countries with five-year documents, but they do happen at the end of the cycle. Sri Lanka wants six months left on the day you arrive. Longer winter stays are possible only through an extension handled by the Department of Immigration and Emigration in Battaramulla, near Colombo.
Pricing
Live fees for Kazakhstan 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 Kazakhstan
Requirements
Everything Kazakhstan 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.
Most applications from Kazakhstan are approved within a day or two, and many sooner. Nothing has to be handed in anywhere: no visit to a consulate, no courier to Moscow, no paper photographs.
Apply three to five days before you fly as a minimum, and earlier than that for departures between late December and mid-January. That fortnight combines Kazakhstan's New Year holidays with Sri Lanka's own high season, the flights from Almaty are full, and there is no slack if a typing error means starting again.
If an agency is applying for your whole group, ask to see each approval rather than accepting a verbal assurance. Check the passport number on it against the document in your hand before you leave for the airport, because Air Astana and the Gulf carriers verify the ETA at check-in.
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
Kazakhstan is unusual in Central Asia in having had its own link to the island: Air Astana has flown Almaty to Colombo nonstop as a seasonal winter service, typically from late December until the end of March. Outside those months, and from Astana, Shymkent or the west of the country, the journey involves one change in the Gulf or India.
Best time to go
The Kazakh calendar and the Sri Lankan one fit together neatly. December to March is the dry season on the west and south coasts and in the hill country, which is exactly when the steppe is at its coldest.
The New Year break at the start of January is the busiest and most expensive time. If your employer allows it, travel in the second half of January or in February instead: the weather on the south coast is just as reliable, whale-watching boats from Mirissa are running, and hotels are easier to find.
Nauryz in late March gives another window. The south-west is still dry then, the crowds have thinned, and it falls just before Sinhala and Tamil New Year in mid-April, when many Sri Lankan businesses close for several days. School summer holidays from June to August point the other way, to the east coast around Trincomalee and Pasikudah.
Jet lag is barely a factor. Kazakhstan now keeps a single time zone at UTC+5 and Sri Lanka sits at UTC+5:30 all year, so your watch moves by thirty minutes. Do note the monthly Poya full-moon days, which are public holidays on which alcohol is not sold.
Avoid these
Problems are rare, and almost always technical rather than substantive. These are the ones that come up most often on applications from Kazakhstan — worth a minute now rather than a new application later.
News coverage in Kazakhstan often summarised the May 2026 change as visa-free travel. It is not. The government charge is waived; the ETA is still required, and a passenger from Almaty without one has a problem at the check-in desk rather than a pleasant surprise.
Kazakhs are asked for their individual identification number so often that entering it becomes a reflex. The ETA attaches to the passport number, and an approval issued against an IIN matches nothing an immigration officer can scan.
Letters such as Қ, Ғ, Ұ, Ү, Ә and Ө have no single obvious Latin equivalent, and older and newer passports do not always spell the same surname identically. Copy the Latin version on the photo page character by character instead of spelling it the way you would on social media.
Package contracts differ. Some include the authorisation, others mention it in small print as the tourist's responsibility. The airport is the wrong place to find out which kind you bought.
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 resident embassy in Astana; Kazakhstan is covered by the embassy in Moscow. That distance does not matter for a holiday, because Kazakh tourists apply for the ETA online and never send a passport abroad.
FAQs
The questions Kazakhstan passport holders ask most often about travelling to Sri Lanka.
Kazakh citizens need an Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA) for Sri Lanka, which is what most people mean when they say visa. It is applied for online before travel and allows a 30-day tourist stay. The Sri Lankan government charge is waived for Kazakhstan, but the authorisation is still compulsory.
The government charge on the tourist ETA has been waived for Kazakh nationals since 25 May 2026. A service fee for our help with the application still applies, so the total is not zero. The live prices shown on this page reflect what a Kazakh applicant pays.
Thirty days, counted from your first arrival. Two entries are allowed, but the second only uses whatever is left of the original thirty days. Anything longer needs an extension from the immigration department in Battaramulla.
In winter, usually yes: Air Astana has operated a seasonal nonstop between Almaty and Colombo from around late December to the end of March. In other months the normal routing is one stop through Dubai, Sharjah, Doha or an Indian city.
Only if it appears in the Latin name fields of your Kazakh passport. For most holders the Latin line shows surname and given name alone, and that is what the form should match.
Yes, and it is a popular pairing from Almaty. The tourist ETA permits two entries, so you can fly to Malé and come back, as long as the return falls within the 30 days that began when you first reached Sri Lanka.
Yes. Each child must be included in an application with their own passport details, whatever their age. The government charge is already waived for Kazakh tourists of all ages, so the practical point is simply not to leave a child off the form.
Aim for at least a week or two before a late-December or early-January departure, even though most approvals take only a day or two. The approval is good for six months, so applying when you book the tour costs nothing.
Your nationality is already set to Kazakhstan. 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.
