Sammarinese passport holders have needed a UK ETA since April 2025. Two years of validity, multiple entries, up to six months in Britain per visit — applied for online in minutes.
6 months
Maximum stay per visit
2 years
ETA validity
Multiple
Entries permitted
3 working days
Typical decision time
100% online
No embassy visit
Overview
San Marino is the oldest surviving sovereign republic in the world, a landlocked enclave of some thirty-four thousand people entirely surrounded by Italy. Its passport is one of the rarest in Europe, and the number of Sammarinese travelling to Britain in any year is correspondingly small — but the connection exists, driven by business, education and the tourism links that Italy's Adriatic coast maintains with the UK.
Since April 2025 Sammarinese citizens have needed an Electronic Travel Authorisation for travel to Britain. San Marino is a non-visa country and nothing about what its citizens may do in the UK has changed. The ETA is a digital pre-travel permission applied for online and attached to the passport number, with no interview, no appointment and no consular involvement.
Two practical points define the Sammarinese experience. San Marino is not in the European Union or the EEA, so its passport holders are not in the ePassport gate cohort and will be seen at a staffed Border Force desk on arrival. And the republic has no airport, so every journey begins at Rimini, Bologna or Ancona — none of which changes the ETA requirement, since it follows the passport rather than the departure point.
At a glance
Eligibility
You do not need a visa, but you do need an ETA. San Marino is a non-visa national country for UK purposes, so Sammarinese citizens travel to Britain as visitors for tourism, family visits, business, conferences or short courses without any consular application. The ETA precedes that permission and does not reduce it — the six months Sammarinese visitors have always been allowed is unchanged.
Every traveller needs their own, at any age. Children and infants need an ETA linked to their own passport and cannot be added to a parent's application. Families travelling together make separate applications for each person, though all can be handled in a single session.
The exemptions are the standard ones. Sammarinese citizens holding a UK visa or indefinite leave to remain do not need an ETA, since their existing status already carries the permission to travel. Dual nationals travelling on a British or Irish passport need nothing at all. Italian dual nationality is common in San Marino, and worth considering: Italian citizens follow the same ETA rules but may use the ePassport gates on arrival, which makes for a quicker entry.
Eligibility follows citizenship rather than residence. Someone living or working in San Marino on an Italian, Romanian or other passport follows the rules for that nationality, not for San Marino. Given how integrated the republic is with the surrounding Italian region, and how many cross-border workers there are, this distinction matters more than the country's size suggests.
Stay & validity
An approved ETA is valid for two years from the date it is granted, or until your Sammarinese passport expires, whichever comes first. Within that window there is no limit on entries, and each visit can last up to six months. Given the effort involved in reaching Britain from San Marino, an authorisation covering two years of travel is a real convenience.
The passport-expiry rule is the one to check before applying. The ETA is bound to the passport number you enter and ends when that document does. Sammarinese passports are issued for ten years for adults and shorter periods for children, so families applying together may find the children's authorisations expiring well before the parents'. Renewal does not transfer the ETA and there is no refund.
Britain does not require six months of onward passport validity, only that the passport covers your stay. This is more relaxed than the Schengen rule for third-country nationals, which Sammarinese travellers encounter regularly when flying from Italian airports.
Six months per visit is the maximum for a single entry rather than an annual allowance. In practice almost no Sammarinese trip approaches it. Where it matters is education — a short language course or summer programme finishing within six months is covered by an ETA, while an academic year at a British university requires a Student visa applied for in advance.
Pricing
Live fees for Sammarinese passport holders, shown all-in — the Home Office charge and our service fee together, with nothing added later.
Your nationality is pre-selected as San Marino
Requirements
Everything Sammarinese passport holders need before starting an application. The first five items apply to every applicant; the rest are specific to your nationality.
Passport bio-data page — a clear colour scan or photo showing your photograph, full name, date of birth, passport number and expiry date
Recent digital photograph — full face visible against a plain background, taken within the last six months, with no headwear other than for religious or medical reasons
A valid email address, which is where the approval is sent and which you should keep accessible while travelling
A credit or debit card to pay the Home Office ETA fee and our service fee together
Your travel and accommodation details — Border Force can ask about the purpose of your visit and where you are staying
Simple process
Four steps, entirely online, with our team checking every field before anything reaches the Home Office.
Enter your passport details exactly as printed, answer the suitability questions and upload your photograph. Most applicants finish in under ten minutes.
Our team checks your photo, passport number, name spelling and declarations against Home Office requirements before anything is submitted.
Your application goes to UK Visas and Immigration with the government fee paid, and we track its status until a decision is issued.
There is no sticker, label or document to print. The authorisation is held digitally against your passport number, and we explain exactly what to show at check-in.
Applications from San Marino are decided automatically in almost all cases, and most applicants receive approval within minutes. The Home Office asks travellers to allow up to three working days, and a small number are referred for manual review, usually where a photograph fails the automated check.
Apply at least a week before travelling. The buffer is there so that a mistyped passport number or a rejected photograph can be corrected without a second payment, not because the decision itself is slow.
One point specific to the Sammarinese passport: because it is issued in such small numbers, some airline check-in systems and online forms handle it less smoothly than more common documents. That is not a reason for concern, but it is a reason to have the ETA confirmed well before departure rather than relying on resolving a query at the airport.
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.
Your nationality is not currently in the ePassport gate cohort, so you join the queue for a staffed desk on arrival. Your ETA is exactly the same document and carries exactly the same permission — only the arrival process differs.
The officer may ask where you are staying, how long you intend to remain and how the trip is funded. Having your hotel booking, return ticket and, if you are visiting family, their address to hand makes this a thirty-second conversation.
Desk queues at Heathrow can be long at peak arrival banks, particularly early morning. If you are connecting onward to a domestic or European flight, allow more than the airline's minimum connection time.
Unlike the automated gates, a staffed desk stamps your passport with the date of entry. That stamp is your evidence of when your six-month permission began, so do not let it be obscured or removed.
Getting there
San Marino has no airport, and Rimini is the nearest at around thirty minutes by road, though its British connections are largely seasonal. Bologna is the practical gateway at roughly two hours, with a strong year-round network to London and the British regions. Ancona and Florence offer further options.
Best time to go
San Marino has a Mediterranean-influenced climate softened by its hilltop position, and Sammarinese visitors should expect Britain to be cooler and considerably wetter for most of the year. The compensation is daylight: a June evening in Scotland runs several hours longer than one in the Apennines.
May, June and September are the best months for a British trip, offering the most reliable weather and prices below the July and August peak. September is particularly good value, with the British school holidays over and the weather in the south often holding into October.
The Italian holiday calendar shapes the practical options, since flights depart from Italian airports. Ferragosto in mid-August is the peak of Italian outbound travel and coincides with the British peak too — the worst combination for price and crowds. The weeks either side of it are markedly better, and late September through October is excellent value on both sides.
One practical note. Britain is one hour behind San Marino year-round, with both changing clocks on the same dates. Build the ground transfer into your planning: Bologna is around two hours away, and while Rimini is much closer, its British services are seasonal and thin enough that most journeys will start at Bologna regardless.
Avoid these
Refusals are rare, and almost always technical rather than substantive. These are the problems that come up most often on applications from San Marino — we check for every one of them before submitting.
Eligibility follows the passport, not the residence permit or place of work. San Marino has a substantial population of Italian and other nationals living and working there, and a large daily cross-border workforce. Each traveller follows their own nationality's rules, and non-European passport holders may need a Standard Visitor visa rather than an ETA.
San Marino is not in the EU or the EEA, so Sammarinese passport holders are not in the ePassport gate cohort and will be seen at a staffed Border Force desk on arrival. The ETA is exactly the same document and carries the same permission — only the arrival process differs. Allow a little extra time during busy arrival periods.
Because San Marino has no airport, every journey starts in Italy. Some travellers assume that makes it an Italian departure governed by Italian arrangements. It does not — the ETA follows your nationality and your passport, so a Sammarinese passport holder needs a Sammarinese-nationality ETA regardless of where the flight leaves from.
The Sammarinese passport is issued in very small numbers, and some check-in systems handle it less smoothly than commoner documents. Have the ETA confirmed and the approval email accessible well before departure rather than expecting to sort out any question at the desk.
The ETA permits study of up to six months. A short language course or summer programme is covered; an academic year at a British university is not, and needs a Student visa applied for in advance. It cannot be arranged from within the UK after arriving on an ETA.
The ETA is bound to a passport number and dies with that document. Renewal voids it with no transfer and no refund. Check the expiry date before applying, and check children's passports separately since they are issued for shorter periods.
Passport number mistyped
By far the most common problem. The authorisation attaches to the number you enter, so a single wrong character produces an ETA that does not exist as far as the airline's check is concerned.
An undeclared conviction or refusal
The Home Office asks about criminal convictions and previous immigration refusals or removals. History found later is treated far more seriously than the original matter would have been if declared.
A photograph that fails the check
Shadows across the face, glasses, a patterned background or a cropped chin all cause the automated check to reject an image, which turns a routine approval into a manual review.
Conditions
These conditions are set by the UK Home Office and do not vary by nationality. The passport-linking rule in particular catches out a great many otherwise well-planned trips.
Your authorisation is held digitally against the passport number you enter. There is nothing placed in your passport and nothing to print for the border. If you renew or replace that passport, the ETA does not transfer — you must apply for a new one on the new document.
Every person travelling needs their own ETA, including babies and children. A child cannot be added to a parent's application, and each traveller needs their own valid passport to apply against.
An approved ETA lasts two years from the date it is granted, or until the expiry date of the passport it is linked to, whichever comes first. This is the single most misunderstood rule in the scheme — a passport with eight months left produces an ETA with eight months left.
Within its validity you can travel to the UK as many times as you like. Each individual visit can be up to six months. There is no formal annual cap, but repeated long stays that add up to the majority of the year will attract questions at the border.
One ETA covers England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and it is also accepted for travel to Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man. You do not need a separate authorisation for the Crown Dependencies.
An ETA lets you board your flight, train or ship. The decision to admit you is made by Border Force on arrival, who can ask about your funds, your accommodation, your onward plans and the purpose of your visit.
Consular services
The United Kingdom does not maintain a mission in San Marino; relations are conducted through the British Embassy in Rome, which is accredited to the republic. It has no role in issuing an ETA — the application is completed online and decided digitally, with no interview, no appointment and no passport submission. The embassy handles consular assistance, visa routes where an ETA is not appropriate, and support for applicants whose circumstances require a human decision.
FAQs
The questions Sammarinese passport holders ask most often about travelling to the United Kingdom.
No. Sammarinese citizens do not need a visa for tourism, business visits, short study or transit in the United Kingdom. Since April 2025 they do need an Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA), a digital permission linked to the passport rather than a visa. It is applied for online in about ten minutes and usually approved the same day.
No. San Marino is not in the EU or the EEA, so its passport holders are not currently in the ePassport gate cohort and will be seen by a Border Force officer at a staffed desk. Your ETA is exactly the same document and carries the same permission — only the arrival process differs.
Either works, since Italian citizens also need an ETA and follow the same rules. The practical difference is at the border: Italian passport holders may use the ePassport gates while Sammarinese passport holders are seen at a staffed desk. If you hold both and want the quicker arrival, travel on the Italian passport and apply for the ETA against that number.
No. The ETA attaches to you and your passport, not to your departure airport. Because San Marino has no airport, every journey begins in Italy, but that makes no difference to the requirement — a Sammarinese passport holder needs an ETA regardless of where the flight departs from.
Only if they hold a nationality that is itself eligible. Eligibility follows the passport you travel on, not your residence in San Marino. Italian and other passport holders living or working in the republic follow their own nationality's rules, and non-European passport holders may need a Standard Visitor visa.
Up to six months per visit. The ETA is valid for two years, or until your passport expires if that is sooner, and permits unlimited entries within that period. Six months is a per-visit maximum rather than an annual allowance.
Only for courses lasting up to six months, such as a summer school or a short language programme. An academic year or a full degree requires a Student visa applied for in advance. You cannot switch to a Student visa from within the UK after arriving on an ETA.
Yes. Every traveller needs an ETA regardless of age, including babies, and each is linked to that person's own passport. Children cannot be added to a parent's application. Children's passports are issued for shorter periods than adults', so check each expiry date — the ETA ends when the passport does.
No. The ETA is tied to the specific passport number you applied with and becomes invalid when that passport is replaced. There is no transfer and no refund. If your passport is nearing expiry, renew it first and then apply for the ETA against the new number.
Yes. A single ETA covers the entire United Kingdom and is also accepted for Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man. There are no internal immigration checks between the four nations, so a trip combining London and Edinburgh needs only one authorisation.
Your nationality is already set to San Marino. Complete the form in under ten minutes, and our team will check every detail before it reaches the Home Office.
Other nationalities
Requirements, routes and border formalities differ by passport. Here are the guides for other eligible nationalities.
