Whether you are flying from Oslo for winter sun or to see family in Jaffna, a Norwegian passport needs an approved ETA first. The tourist ETA allows 30 days with two entries, and its government charge is waived for Norwegians.
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
Norway's connection with Sri Lanka runs deeper than tourism. Norwegian diplomats facilitated the peace talks of the early 2000s, and Norway is home to a well-established community of Sri Lankan Tamil origin, concentrated in Oslo and along the west coast. Many trips from Norway are family visits first and holidays second.
Alongside them is a growing number of Norwegians who simply want warmth in January. Offshore workers on rotation, with weeks of leave at a stretch, have long favoured Asia, and Sri Lanka offers surf at Weligama, leopards in Yala and train rides through tea estates within one compact island.
Both groups need the same thing before boarding: an Electronic Travel Authorisation, often called a Sri Lanka visa or e-visa. Norway is on the list of 40 countries whose government charge for the tourist ETA has been waived since 25 May 2026. Our service fee still applies, and the live prices shown on this page set out what you will pay.
At a glance
Eligibility
Norwegian citizens need an ETA for any short visit to Sri Lanka, and it should be approved before departure. Norway's place outside the EU makes no difference in either direction; the requirement covers all foreign nationals alike, and the waiver for Norwegians removes only the government charge, not the authorisation.
This applies equally to Norwegians of Sri Lankan background. If you travel on a Norwegian passport you are a foreign national at the border in Colombo, however many relatives are waiting outside the terminal. Visiting family is a recognised purpose of the tourist ETA, so that is the option to choose for a trip home to Jaffna, Batticaloa or Colombo.
The tourist ETA also covers holidays, medical treatment including Ayurveda, sporting events and cultural performances. It excludes work of any kind. Norwegians travelling for aid organisations should take particular note that NGO work requires prior government approval and is not available through the online ETA.
For a business meeting, a seminar or a training course of less than a month, select the business option. For a stopover of up to two days on the way to somewhere else, the transit ETA carries no government charge but does require documentary proof of your onward journey.
Stay & validity
The stay granted to a Norwegian citizen on a tourist ETA is 30 days from first arrival. Two entries are permitted within those 30 days. A family combining Sri Lanka with a few days visiting relatives in Chennai can therefore leave and return, but the second arrival receives only the balance of the original period.
You have six months from the date of issue to make the journey, subject to whatever conditions are printed on the approval itself. Norwegians on offshore rotations, whose leave is fixed long in advance, can apply well ahead.
Family visits from Norway often run longer than a month, especially over the summer holiday. Thirty days is the limit of the ETA, and anything beyond it requires an extension from the Department of Immigration and Emigration, which has its head office at Battaramulla outside Colombo.
Pricing
Live fees for Norwegian 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 Norway
Requirements
Everything Norwegian 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.
Approvals for Norwegian applicants usually come through within one or two days. Nobody can guarantee a turnaround, so allow three to five days at the very least. If you are travelling in late December, around påske or at the start of the fellesferie in July, add more margin than that.
Summer deserves a special mention for the Norwegian-Tamil community. Flights to Colombo in late June and July fill with families travelling for weddings and temple festivals, and applications for large family groups take longer to prepare simply because there are more passports to check.
A mistake discovered after payment means a fresh application, because a submitted ETA cannot be corrected. Government charges are in general non-refundable and non-transferable. For Norwegian citizens that charge is waived at present, but the lost days are real, so have each traveller confirm their own line on the review screen.
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
Norway has no nonstop service to Sri Lanka. From Oslo Gardermoen the main one-stop routings are Qatar Airways via Doha, Emirates via Dubai and Turkish Airlines via Istanbul. Travellers from Bergen, Stavanger, Trondheim and Tromsø normally add a domestic leg to Oslo or a short hop to Copenhagen first. Some families heading for the north of the island route through Chennai and continue on a regional flight to Jaffna.
Best time to go
For sun-seekers, the Norwegian winter is the natural season. December to March brings dry weather to the south and west coasts and to the hill country, at exactly the time when daylight in Tromsø disappears altogether. Vinterferie in weeks 8 and 9 falls neatly inside this window and suits a first trip with children.
Easter is trickier. Many Norwegians cannot imagine påske anywhere but a mountain cabin, yet those who do leave will find the south-west still pleasant in late March. When Easter falls in mid-April it can overlap with Sinhala and Tamil New Year, a family holiday during which shops, restaurants and transport run at reduced levels.
The fellesferie in July points you east and north. Trincomalee, Pasikudah and Arugam Bay have their best weather from May to September, and Jaffna is dry and hot. The south-west monsoon is soaking Galle and Colombo at the same time, so a July itinerary built around the southern beaches will disappoint.
The time difference is four and a half hours in the Norwegian winter and three and a half in summer. Høstferie in early October lands in the inter-monsoon weeks, when short, heavy showers can appear anywhere on the island. The Cultural Triangle copes with rain better than a beach does.
Avoid these
Problems are rare, and almost always technical rather than substantive. These are the ones that come up most often on applications from Norway — worth a minute now rather than a new application later.
Since Norway introduced its national ID card, many Norwegians carry two travel documents and reach for the card first. It is not what Sri Lanka's system is linked to. The ETA attaches to a passport number, so copy it from the passport's photo page and travel with that same passport.
Names of Tamil origin are often recorded differently in Norway than they are used in Sri Lanka, with a father's name serving as the surname or initials expanded in full. The application must follow the Norwegian passport to the letter. A version that matches an old Sri Lankan document but not the passport in your hand will not match at immigration.
Norwegian school holidays are long, and visits to grandparents tend to fill them. The tourist ETA stops at 30 days. Book the trip on the assumption that you will either leave within that period or apply for an extension in Battaramulla in good time.
Norwegian adults renew once a decade and forget how quickly children's passports lapse. A child's passport with five months left on the arrival date fails the six-month rule even though the parents' documents are fine, and a replacement brings a new number that needs its own application.
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 no longer keeps a resident embassy in Oslo, and Norway is served from the Sri Lankan embassy in Stockholm. For an ETA that makes no practical difference: Norwegian citizens apply online and never need to send a passport abroad or attend in person.
FAQs
The questions Norwegian passport holders ask most often about travelling to Sri Lanka.
Yes, Norwegians need an Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA), the online permission widely referred to as a Sri Lanka visa, before they travel. It covers a tourist stay of 30 days with two entries and is linked to the number of your Norwegian passport.
Not for a tourist ETA. Norway is one of the 40 countries covered by the waiver that took effect on 25 May 2026. A service fee for our assistance with the application still applies, and the current figures are in the live prices shown on this page.
If you are entering Sri Lanka on your Norwegian passport, yes. The ETA requirement is based on the passport you present, and visiting relatives is one of the purposes a tourist ETA allows. Enter your name exactly as the Norwegian passport prints it.
No. The nasjonalt ID-kort is not a substitute for a passport on this journey. You need a Norwegian passport with six months of validity remaining on arrival, and the ETA must be issued against that passport's number.
Up to 30 days from the first entry. A second entry is allowed inside that period but does not extend it. Norwegians who wish to stay for the whole summer holiday must apply to the Department of Immigration and Emigration for an extension.
There is no scheduled nonstop. Most passengers from Oslo connect once in Doha, Dubai or Istanbul.
Apply once tickets are booked and at least three to five days ahead, preferably two weeks for a large family group. An approved ETA can be used for six months from issue, so an application made in May comfortably covers a fellesferie departure.
No. Employment, whether paid or unpaid, falls outside the tourist ETA, and work for non-governmental organisations requires prior approval from the Sri Lankan government. That approval cannot be obtained through the online ETA process.
Your nationality is already set to Norway. 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.
