Russia has announced a new E-Visa for 52 countries starting from 1 January 2021.
With the payment of $40 online fees, nationals of these 52 countries will be able to stay in Russia for 16 days. The most astonishing things are that applicants/travellers will not have to present at the time of application of the invitation letter, proof of accommodation or ticket bookings.
Russia has already been running E-Visa services for only 3 of its areas St. Petersburg, Kaliningrad, and Vladivostok for a total stay of 8 days. But now, the whole country will be open for tourism through this visa for at least 16 days as a single entry term.
Russia’s E-Visa requirements and details?
- Interested applicants will have to pay a visa fee of $40 whereas children under the age of 6 are exempt from the fee.
- E-Visa application has to be made online on the officially administrated website of the Russian Foreign Ministry.
- On the above-mentioned website, applicants will have to fill in the online application form and have to submit a scanned copy of the passport and a photo.
- The processing time is a maximum of 4 days.
- From the day of issuance, the visa is valid for 60 days.
- A total stay of 16 days is allowed.
- The visa is a single entry visa only, for each time of travel, one has to apply for a new visa online.
- Visitors will need to present a printed copy of their e-visa notification as well as a valid passport at border control.
- E-visa holders can enter Russia through 29 border crossings, including international airports in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Yekaterinburg, Kazan, Krasnodar, and Novosibirsk.
What happens after submitting an application?
You can use this site to follow up on the status of your application. Once a relevant decision is taken, the status of your application will be changed to “Visa issued” or “Visa denied”. You will be able to download a PDF file with the information concerning the decision on the application thereafter. Automatic messages concerning the status of your application and the decision thereon as well as detailed instructions for further steps will be sent to your personal e-mail. Download and print the notification with your e-visa.
E-visas will be issued online for tourism, business, humanitarian, and guest trips.
List of eligible countries
Here is the list of 52 eligible countries, whose nationals can apply for an E-Visa of Russia.
1. Austria
2. Andorra
3. Bahrain
4. Belgium
5. Bulgaria
6. the Vatican
7. Hungary
8. Germany
9. Greece
10. Denmark
11. India
12. Indonesia
13.Iran
14. Ireland
15. Iceland
16. Spain
17. Italy
18. Cyprus
19. China (including Taiwan)
20. Democratic People’s Republic of Korea
21. Kuwait
22. Latvia
23. Lithuania
24. Liechtenstein
25. Luxembourg
26. Malaysia
27. Malta
28. Mexico
29. Monaco
30. the Netherlands
31. Norway
32. Oman
33. Poland
34. Portugal
35. Romania
36. San Marino
37.Saudi Arabia
38. North Macedonia
39. Serbia
40. Singapore
41. Slovakia
42. Slovenia
43. Turkey
44. the Philippines
45. Finland
46. France
47. Croatia
48. the Czech Republic
49. Switzerland
50. Sweden
51. Estonia
52. Japan
The e-visa validity period and (or) the allowed period of stay under the e-visa are not subject to extension, except in cases where it is impossible to leave the territory of the Russian Federation due to medical emergency, or force-majeure circumstances, or natural hazards. E-visas can be of the following categories only: ordinary business visa (purpose of journey is business), ordinary tourist visa (purpose of journey is tourism), and ordinary humanitarian visa (purposes of journey are sports, cultural, scientific and technological ties). If the purpose of your journey to the Russian Federation does not correspond to any of the above, you should apply for a traditional (non electronic) visa at a diplomatic mission or consular office of the Russian Federation.
Important things to remember
- At the time of visa application, one must remember the following:
- If you are traveling with your minor children indicated in your passport, a separate e-visa application must be submitted for each child. All minor children traveling with their parents must have their own e visa.
- Your passport must be valid for at least 6 months from the date you applied for an e-visa. Your passport must have free space for border crossing stamps.
- Foreign citizens who have arrived in the Russian Federation with e-visas are required to have medical insurance valid in the Russian Federation’s territory for the entire period of stay.
- You can fill in an application form for an e-visa on this website not earlier than 20 days and no later than 4 days before the intended date of entry into the Russian Federation.
- The day of entry and the day of exit are counted as two days. To determine how long you will be allowed to stay in the Russian Federation. Just remember one simple rule: if you, for example, passed through the passport control when entering on Monday, you must pass the passport control for exit no later than the next Monday. If you entered on Tuesday, you must exit no later than the next week’s Tuesday (and so on for each day of the week). In any case, you must exit no later than the visa expiry date, even if your period of stay is less than 8 days. For instance, you entered on Monday and the validity period of the visa expires on Sunday: in this case, you must exit no later than Sunday.
How to fill in the visa E-Visa Russia application form
To apply for the E-Visa of Russia, the application has to be made online on the officially administrated website of the Russian Foreign Ministry. You must fill in the online application form through the following instructions:
- A web browser with JavaScript. The website currently supports the browsers: Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge.
- Your valid national passport.
- Choose the tips language from the relevant drop-down list. Tips will clarify the meaning of the questions you need to answer. If you have chosen Russian as the tips language all answers to the questions in the application must be entered only in Russian, with the exception of surnames, given names, addresses, and names of institutions that are required to be entered in English. If you have chosen English all your answers must be only in English with the use of the Latin alphabet characters.
- Confirm that you agree to the automatic processing, transfer, and storage of data provided in your application for e-visa purposes.
- To start a new application, click the “Proceed to Fill in the Application” button.
- To continue filling in, edit, review, or print the completed application choose the “Retrieve Application” menu item.
- Enter your personal e-mail address and confirm it, then enter your password for this site and confirm it.
- Write down or print the Application ID displayed in the top left corner of the page. It will be required to continue your application if the session has been disconnected. To save your draft application, click the “Save the Draft” button. Your e-visa application form will be available within 30 days since it’s last saved.
- Proceed to fill in the fields of the application. Follow the tips on each page of the application. Fields marked with an asterisk (*) are required. If you have made any errors while filling in the form or have not filled in the required fields, they will be highlighted and a message will appear under them indicating the error you need to fix.
- Upload your digital color photo in the JPEG format.
- Click the button sending the application and wait for the confirmation of its acceptance for processing.