South African passport holders need an approved ETA before boarding for Colombo. It gives 30 days and two entries, which suits a fortnight of beaches and tea country, or a Sri Lanka and Maldives pairing over the December break.
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
Sri Lanka has become a serious alternative to Mauritius, Zanzibar and Thailand for South Africans who want an Indian Ocean holiday with more to it than a sun lounger. Driving is on the left and the food suits anyone raised on Durban curry. Cricket followers know Galle from Proteas tours.
What catches South Africans out is the paperwork. The green passport gets its holder into a fair number of Indian Ocean destinations with nothing more than a stamp, so it is easy to assume Sri Lanka works the same way. It does not. An Electronic Travel Authorisation has to be applied for online and approved before you leave home, and Emirates or Qatar Airways staff at OR Tambo, Cape Town International and King Shaka will look for it at the check-in desk.
This page sets out how the ETA applies to a South African passport: the stay it gives, the details to copy carefully, and which of the four school holidays suits which Sri Lankan coast.
At a glance
Eligibility
Yes. South Africa has no exemption arrangement with Sri Lanka, so every South African citizen visiting for a holiday needs an ETA in place first. People search for it as a Sri Lanka visa or e-visa, and for practical purposes it is the same thing: an electronic permission recorded against your passport number, with nothing pasted into the book.
South Africa is not among the countries whose nationals have the government charge lifted, so the standard rate applies to a green passport. The exception within a South African family is age. A child under 12 is not charged the government fee on a tourist ETA, although that child must still be entered as a traveller.
Plenty of South Africans carry a second passport through a British, Dutch, German or Portuguese parent or grandparent. The ETA is assessed on the passport you type into the form, not on your birthplace, so decide which book you will actually hand over in Colombo and apply with that one.
A tourist ETA covers the holiday, the family visit, an Ayurveda stay or travelling to watch the Proteas. If your employer is sending you to a meeting, conference or short training course in Colombo, choose the business option instead.
Stay & validity
A tourist ETA on a South African passport allows 30 days in Sri Lanka, counted from the day you first land. Most South African itineraries run ten to sixteen nights, so the allowance is generous. Once approved, the authorisation can be used at any point in the following six months, which lets you apply as soon as flights are booked.
Two entries are permitted, and this is the feature that makes the popular Sri Lanka and Maldives combination work. You can tour from Colombo to Ella for a week, hop to Malé for five nights, and come back through Bandaranaike before the Gulf flight home. Coming back from Malé does not reset the count, though. If you used nine days before leaving, you return with twenty-one.
Six months of passport validity is required from the date you arrive in Sri Lanka. South African adult passports run for ten years and those issued to children under 16 for five, and it is the children's books that expire unnoticed. Renewal through Home Affairs can take weeks at busy times, so check every passport in the household before paying for anything.
Pricing
Live fees for South African 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 South Africa
Requirements
Everything South African 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 South African passport holders are approved within a day or two, and no visit to Pretoria is involved. We still suggest submitting at least three to five days before departure. A problem found late cannot be fixed at the airport, and the next free seat to Dubai or Doha in season may be days away.
December is the pressure point. South African schools close in the second week of the month just as European winter-sun traffic into Sri Lanka peaks, so both the flights and the application queue are at their busiest. If you are travelling between mid-December and mid-January, apply in November.
Sri Lanka is three and a half hours ahead of South Africa all year, since neither country changes its clocks. An application sent after lunch in Johannesburg arrives when the working day in Colombo is ending, and Poya full-moon days are public holidays there.
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 flight between South Africa and Sri Lanka, so the journey is made in two legs through the Gulf. Emirates via Dubai and Qatar Airways via Doha both serve Johannesburg, Cape Town and Durban and connect onward to Colombo, so travellers from all three cities can avoid a domestic positioning flight.
Best time to go
The long summer holiday from mid-December to mid-January is when most South Africans can get away, and it happens to be the best time of year for the part of Sri Lanka first-time visitors want most. The south and west coasts from Bentota round to Mirissa are dry and calm, the hill country is clear, and blue whales are passing off Mirissa. Book the Kandy to Ella train well ahead.
The March and April break is a quieter and often cheaper window with the same good weather on the south-west side, though it grows hot and humid by April. If your dates run into the middle of April you will meet Sinhala and Tamil New Year, when many shops close for several days and transport fills up.
For the three-week winter holiday in June and July, turn the map around. The south-west is in its monsoon then, while the east coast is at its best: Trincomalee and Pasikudah for flat warm water, Arugam Bay for a surf season that will interest anyone from Jeffreys Bay or the KwaZulu-Natal coast.
The short spring break at the end of September and start of October falls in the inter-monsoon period, when showers can turn up anywhere on the island in the afternoon. It still works for Sigiriya and for Yala, though anyone used to the Kruger should expect a smaller, busier park.
Avoid these
Problems are rare, and almost always technical rather than substantive. These are the ones that come up most often on applications from South Africa — worth a minute now rather than a new application later.
Surnames such as Janse van Rensburg, van der Merwe or du Plessis are a single surname field on a South African passport. Typing only the last word, or running the parts together, produces an ETA that does not match the book. Copy the surname line in full, spaces included.
Parents check their own ten-year passports and forget that a child's was issued for five. A book with less than six months remaining on arrival will stop that child at check-in even with an approved ETA, and a replacement is rarely quick in the weeks before the December holidays.
Dual nationals sometimes complete the form with a British or EU passport and then check in on the green one because that is what the ticket was booked with. The authorisation follows one passport number only. Use one book for both the ETA and the airline booking.
Flights to the Gulf leave South Africa in the afternoon or evening and the Colombo connection lands the next day. The form asks when you reach Sri Lanka, so use the arrival line of your e-ticket for the second leg.
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's High Commission in Pretoria looks after relations with South Africa and several neighbouring states. South African tourists do not need to contact it, send a passport to it or book an appointment for an ETA, because the whole process is online. It handles matters the online ETA does not cover, such as journalism assignments.
FAQs
The questions South African passport holders ask most often about travelling to Sri Lanka.
Yes, South African citizens need an Electronic Travel Authorisation, often called a Sri Lanka visa or e-visa, before travelling. It is applied for online, linked to your passport number and gives a 30-day stay with two entries. There is no exemption for the South African passport.
Up to 30 days from the date of first arrival on a tourist ETA. Staying longer means asking the Department of Immigration and Emigration in Battaramulla for an extension before the month is up.
No. South Africa is not one of the countries covered by Sri Lanka's waiver of the government charge, so the standard rate applies alongside our service fee. Children under 12 are not charged the government portion. The live prices shown on this page are the ones to rely on.
Yes, provided both arrivals fall inside the 30 days that began when you first landed. The second entry gives you only what is left of that period.
At least three to five days, and several weeks ahead for travel in the December and January school holidays. An approved ETA stays usable for six months, so there is nothing to gain by waiting.
Use whichever passport you will hand to the immigration officer in Colombo, and book the flight in the same one. The ETA and the charge that applies both follow the passport entered on the application.
No. Meetings, conferences, seminars and short training count as business purposes and need the business option.
If you stay airside for a connection you are not entering the country. If you want to leave the airport for a night or two, for example on the way to Malé, a transit ETA allows up to two days and requires proof of your onward ticket.
Your nationality is already set to South Africa. 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.
