Thailand tightens tourist entry rules and delays app rollout amid declining arrivals

Thailand's new visa regulations and digitalisation efforts come into force in September 2026, aiming to tighten border controls amid a slump in international visitor numbers since the pandemic recovery.

Thailand’s most sweeping rewrite of its tourist entry rules since the post-pandemic reopening now has a start date: the new regime comes into force on 15 September 2026, after publication in the Royal Gazette at the end of August. At the same time, the country’s much-publicised Thailand Immigration Management app, or THIM, is still being run as a pilot tool rather than a replacement for the existing digital arrival process, meaning foreign visitors must continue filing the Thailand Digital Arrival Card before they travel.

That tightening comes as Bangkok tries to protect a tourism industry that remains crucial to the economy while addressing concerns that looser entry rules had outlived their purpose. Reuters reported in May that officials believed the 60-day exemption introduced in 2024 to stimulate travel after the pandemic had been misused. Mungkorn Pratoomkaew, director-general of the foreign ministry’s consular affairs department, said the review was driven by "reciprocity, security issues and policy duplication". The timing is awkward for the sector: according to Reuters, international arrivals from 1 January to 17 May 2026 were down 3.31% year on year to 12.9 million, while the state planning agency was expecting 32 million foreign visitors this year, slightly below the roughly 33 million recorded in 2025.

When the cabinet first approved the overhaul on 19 May, officials presented it as a broader simplification of a system that had become cluttered by overlapping privileges. Government statements and reporting by The Nation said the redesign would follow a "one country, one Thai visa exemption privilege" principle. In outline, that meant scrapping the blanket 60-day exemption for 93 countries and territories, reshaping the 30-day tourist exemption, creating a 15-day category for a small group of nationalities and sharply narrowing eligibility for Visa on Arrival. Authorities also made clear that travellers already inside Thailand, or those arriving before the new measures took effect, would be allowed to remain until the expiry date stamped in their passports.

However, the detailed country lists did not stay fixed between the cabinet decision and the final implementation notices. Early official summaries in May described a 30-day exemption list cut from 57 countries and territories to 54, a new 15-day list covering three, and Visa on Arrival eligibility reduced from 31 to four. After the Royal Gazette publication, a later Tourism Authority of Thailand update set out a different final distribution for the regime due to begin on 15 September: 60 countries and territories on the 30-day list, Seychelles and Mauritius on a 15-day exemption, and Azerbaijan, Belarus and Serbia on Visa on Arrival. That shift is significant because it means travellers relying on reports from May or June may now be working from outdated country lists.

Embassy guidance has also made the real-world consequences clearer than the early cabinet briefings did. The Royal Thai Embassy in Moscow said Russian passport holders would lose the 60-day exemption but would still be able to enter for up to 30 days under the bilateral arrangement between Thailand and Russia. Belarusian nationals remain eligible for a 15-day Visa on Arrival with a THB 2,000 fee. Uzbek and Armenian passport holders, by contrast, must obtain an appropriate visa before travel from 15 September, while Moldovan citizens continue to need a visa as before. The embassy advised travellers who now require visas to apply at least 14 business days in advance and to wait for approval before departure.

On the digital side, the official picture is more cautious than some travel sites have suggested. The Tourism Authority said pilot access to THIM opened on 11 June 2026 and described the app as optional during this phase. It also stressed that THIM is "not an additional arrival-card requirement and does not replace TDAC at this stage". In practical terms, the app lets travellers photograph their passport so details can be read automatically, then add accommodation, travel information and the purpose of entry in line with arrival-card requirements. The authority said individual registration should take no more than three minutes, while group submissions can cover up to 10 travellers, a feature aimed at families and tour parties.

THIM’s ambitions go well beyond speeding people through the airport queue. The app is available on iOS and Android and initially supports English, Russian, Japanese and Chinese, with at least 15 more languages planned. According to the Tourism Authority, it is being built into a broader immigration service platform for short-stay visitors, long-stay residents and other foreign nationals living in Thailand. Future features under development include digital document submission, appointments with immigration officers and online handling of selected requests where a face-to-face visit is unnecessary. Registered users can already contact the Tourist Police through the app around the clock.

Taken together, the measures show Thailand trying to draw a sharper line between convenience and control. Ministers have not closed off tourism; they have shortened the automatic stay for many visitors, cleaned up overlapping schemes and tied the border process more closely to digital pre-registration. But the transition is not as neat as the more breathless coverage implied. The visa framework changed shape between cabinet approval and final publication, and THIM has not yet displaced the existing arrival card. For travellers, the message is simple: check the rules against the latest official nationality-specific guidance before booking, and do not assume that either last year’s visa waiver or an expected app launch is still the rule that applies.