Nepal Tourist Visa Extension in 2026: From the On-Arrival Stamp to the Airport Exit Counter

Search for how to extend a Nepal tourist visa and you'll land on the same thing over and over: a fee table lifted from a few years back, plus one line at the bottom telling you to visit immigration and pay. That line is true and almost useless. The part that actually costs travellers time is the sequence. Which stamp starts your clock. Which office will accept your file. What to do when the last legal day of your stay lands on a public holiday.

The on-arrival stamp is what starts your clock

Nepal issues tourist visas on arrival at Tribhuvan International Airport and at a number of designated land crossings, and the Department of Immigration is the authority behind both the arrival grant and any extension afterwards.

The counting is what people get wrong. Your permitted stay runs from the entry stamp in your passport, not from the date you booked your flight or the day you meant to land. Touch down at 11pm and that's still day one. So before you plan anything else, open the passport and read the stamp yourself. Work backwards from that date, not from your itinerary.

The 15, 30 and 90-day on-arrival options are the ones most commonly described, but Nepal has revised its visa rules more than once in recent years. Confirm the options, the fee and the current documentation with the Department of Immigration for your own nationality before you fly, rather than trusting a blog post, including this one.

Where you actually go

For most independent travellers the extension is handled at the Department of Immigration in Kathmandu or at the immigration office in Pokhara. Those are the two that come up in practice. Everything past that point drifts: which counter to approach first, which window takes payment, which window hands the passport back, and what days the office is open. Treat all of it as confirm-before-you-go. Check the current location, counter layout and opening days with the department or a verified local contact the day before you plan to show up, not three weeks earlier.

One correction to a lot of older advice: you may not have to stand in the queue yourself. Licensed agents and trekking agencies in Kathmandu and Pokhara routinely handle tourist visa extensions for clients, and plenty of travellers go that route instead of spending a morning at the counter. Whether it works for your case depends on the department's current practice and on the agent being legitimate. Ask the department whether a representative can file on your behalf, and if you do use an agent, pick one who gives you a receipt and copies of everything submitted in your name.

What it costs

The Department of Immigration publishes its current visa and extension fees on its own site, nepalimmigration.gov.np. No figure is printed here on purpose. Rates have changed over the years, they can vary with how long you're extending, and a stale number is worse than no number when you're budgeting. Pull the schedule from the department's page, and if you can't find it there, ask at the counter when you file.

The clock, repeat extensions and the calendar year

Lodge your application before the visa expires. Obvious, and yet a large share of real-world problems come from people leaving it to the final day and finding the office shut.

Whether you can extend more than once is answered case by case, and it depends on how long you've already been in the country and under what category. Ask at the counter when you file the first one. Same goes for the total number of tourist days Nepal allows in a calendar year. A ceiling gets quoted often online, but if nobody can point you to the Department of Immigration's own current notice saying it, don't build your year around that number.

If your visa lapses on a day the office is closed

Don't let it get there. File early enough that a weekend or public holiday cannot swallow your last legal day. If you're already in that spot, contact the Department of Immigration directly and ask what to do, rather than assuming a grace day exists. There is no safe assumption here, and the cost of guessing is measured in more than money.

Overstay is bigger than a fine

The common mental model is that overstaying is a per-day charge you settle at the airport on the way out. That model is too small. Nepal's immigration law allows for more than a fine, and deportation and a ban on re-entry are on the table in serious or repeated cases. An entry ban doesn't stay in Nepal either. It follows you onto visa application forms for other countries for years, and you have to declare it.

So if you have overstayed, deal with it at the immigration office before your departure date, not at the airport with a boarding pass in hand. Per-day rates are not printed here deliberately, because they change and because the wrong number is worse than no number. Get the current figure from the department.

The airport exit counter

This is the least-covered step and the one most likely to catch you out. Any overstay is settled with immigration before you clear departure immigration, not after, which puts it in the same queue you're already anxious about.

Peak season at Tribhuvan International Airport means long lines at the immigration desks, so if you have anything to resolve, add real buffer to the time you reach the terminal rather than the usual two hours. Carry some local currency in cash, because card acceptance at a government counter is not something to bet a flight on, and confirm the current desk location and accepted payment methods once you're at the airport. This is exactly the kind of detail that changes without anyone announcing it.

Tourist visa extension is not every visa extension

A lot of articles blur these together. Extending a tourist visa is a different process from extending a business, student, residential or other non-tourist category, usually at a different desk with a different document set. If you're not on a tourist visa, following tourist visa instructions and hoping they work is how you lose a week.

Before you go

None of this is legal or immigration advice, and none of it replaces the Department of Immigration's own current guidance for your specific case. What you can rely on is the shape of the process. The entry stamp sets the clock. The Kathmandu office or the Pokhara immigration office takes the file. Overstay is a much bigger problem than a fine. The exit counter is a time risk worth planning around. Confirm the current fee, documents, office hours and extension limits with the department, then build your plans around the stamp in your passport rather than the schedule in your head.