Mozambique ETA & Visa 2026: Real Cost and How to Apply

Mozambique entry requirements depend on your passport, your purpose and how long you’re staying — and since February 2026, almost everyone arranges their permission online before flying. A visa exemption, an ETA and a full e-visa are three different things, and being exempt from one doesn’t exempt you from the others.

Start here

If you’re flying, sort your entry permission before you go to the airport. Mozambique used to sell visas on arrival, and it mostly doesn’t any more — which is why so much of the older advice online is wrong. The catch isn’t immigration, though: it’s that airlines check your approval at check-in and won’t board you without it.

Three things decide which group you’re in:

• Your passport — not your residence, and not your continent. The lists below split by the passport you’ll physically carry.
• Your purpose — these categories cover tourism and business. Work, study, residence and investment are separate.
• How long you’re staying — an exemption or ETA covers a fixed number of days, and asking for longer moves you into a full e-visa.

Allow at least five working days, and more if you can. That is the lead time the FCDO requires and roughly what the portal FAQ quotes for processing — but it is a minimum in normal conditions, not a promise, and it leaves you nothing if your documents come back for correction.

The selector below covers ordinary passports for tourism. Diplomatic and service passports often have their own arrangements, and residence, employment or a longer stay change the category.

Which path are you on?

There are four ways into Mozambique as a tourist, and your passport decides which one applies. The selector above sorts you into one. Here are all four side by side.

1. Visa-free — 17 countries

Who. Angola, Botswana, Cabo Verde, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Namibia, Rwanda, São Tomé & Príncipe, Seychelles, South Africa, Eswatini, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe.

What you do. Nothing online. Turn up with your passport and the usual supporting documents — onward ticket, accommodation, funds. An exemption from the visa is not an exemption from the other checks at the desk.

How long. 30 days per entry for most; 90 days for Botswana, Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania.

Watch out. Check the number of days actually written on your entry stamp, because that is your permission — not what this page says. And a border run doesn’t reliably reset anything.

Passport type matters more here than anywhere else. The exemption list is written per passport type, not per country. A further group — Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, Egypt, Guinea-Bissau, Indonesia, Portugal, South Korea, Thailand, Turkey, Venezuela, Vietnam — is visa-free only on diplomatic, service or official passports. Ordinary passports from those countries fall into the ETA or e-visa groups below. Check yours on evisa.gov.mz.

2. ETA before travel — 29 countries

Who. Belgium, Canada, China, Côte d’Ivoire, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ghana, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States.

What you do. Apply and pay online before you fly. An ETA is not a visa — it’s a pre-travel authorisation for people who are already visa-exempt — but it is just as compulsory, and this is the group most likely to assume otherwise.

How long. 30 days, all passport types.

Watch out. If you’re flying, you cannot pay on arrival — airlines check the approval at check-in and will refuse boarding without it. This is the group the old pay-at-the-border advice hurts most, because being visa-exempt sounds like being done. (Some land borders still behave differently — see visa on arrival.)

Validity. Read the dates on the approval itself. The e-visa’s two-month entry window below is a different document’s rule — don’t assume it applies to your ETA.

3. e-Visa required — everyone else

Who. The default. If your country isn’t on the two lists above or the embassy list below, you’re here. That includes Australia, New Zealand, India, Brazil, most of the EU not already listed (Austria, Greece, Hungary, Poland, Romania and others), most of Latin America, most of the Middle East, most of Africa outside SADC, and most of Southeast Asia.

What you do. Apply at evisa.gov.mz before you fly — upload the documents, pay, wait around five business days, print the approved PDF.

How long. 30, 60 or 90 days — you choose at application.

Two details the portal spells out and most guides miss. The e-visa is valid for two months from the date it’s issued, which is your window to enter the country and is separate from how long you may then stay. And it’s issued as multiple-entry, set from the itinerary you submitted — worth checking on the approval if your trip hops out to another country and back.

Watch out. Apply one to two weeks out, not the week you fly. Rejected applications are not refunded, and there is a five-day clock on fixing a rejection — see what happens if your application is rejected.

4. Embassy only — 6 countries

Who. Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Nepal, Nigeria, Pakistan, Somalia.

What you do. The portal won’t accept your application at all. You apply in person at a Mozambican embassy or consulate.

How long. Plan for weeks, not days.

Mozambique visa cost

An ETA costs around USD 47 — but only about USD 10 of that is the actual Mozambican government fee.

That’s the part nobody explains, and it’s worth understanding before you decide how to travel. The breakdown:

The portal is operated by VFS Global, a private visa-processing company — you can see it in the portal’s own login link, which hands you off to vfsevisa.com. So the bulk of what you pay is a service charge for the online system, not money going to Mozambique. The USD 47 total is the FCDO’s figure; the 650-metical government component is what we see on the ground.

For everything else, here’s the honest state of the published information:

For the full e-visa, there is genuinely no published fee table. The portal’s own fee field currently displays a placeholder string rather than an amount, and no reputable source lists prices per duration. Anyone showing you a confident 30/60/90-day price list is guessing.

Two things to know before you pay:

• It’s one online payment, not a deposit with a balance due at the border. If you’ve paid online, you’ve paid.
• Fees are generally non-refundable after a rejection, per the portal FAQ. That’s the real argument for getting your documents right first time.

Keep the receipt either way — you may be asked for it at the border, and you’ll need it if you extend.

Visa on arrival

Officially no — and if you’re flying, treat that as final. By road, the picture on the ground is messier.

Here’s the honest version, because the official line and what actually happens at some land borders aren’t the same thing.

If you’re flying, get the ETA. This isn’t really about immigration — it’s about the airline. Carriers check your approval at check-in, and an airline that isn’t satisfied simply won’t board you. That happens at your departure airport, thousands of kilometres from anyone in Mozambique who could help. Government guidance is explicit that ETA travellers cannot pay on arrival, and no airline is going to take a chance on the exception.

By road, some crossings currently still process arrivals without a pre-approved ETA, charging the 650-metical government fee at the post. There’s no airline in the chain to stop you, which is why the land borders behave differently from the airports. People who’ve run out of time, or who don’t want to pay the full USD 47, do sometimes cross this way.

We don’t recommend it, and we want to be clear about why rather than just disapproving:

• It is not a documented right. It’s current practice at some posts, not a published rule, and practice can stop overnight without any announcement.
• It varies by border and by day. What worked at one crossing last month tells you nothing about yours.
• If it’s refused, you’re stuck at a remote border post with no realistic way to complete an online application and get approved on the spot.

We would rather tell you this happens than pretend it is impossible and have you hear otherwise from someone who has just done it. But it is a gamble with your whole trip as the stake, and the ETA costs only about USD 37 more than the fee you would pay at the post anyway.

The only travellers who genuinely just turn up are the 17 visa-free nationalities — and even then, travelling without a visa still means facing the usual checks at the desk.

Dates, entries and validity

Your approval carries several different dates, and they mean different things. Mixing them up is the most common way a valid document still fails at the desk. Read each field before you book the final connection.

• Window to enter — two months for an e-visa. Counted from the date of issuance, per the tourist e-visa page. This is how long you have to arrive, not how long you may stay. An ETA is a different document; don’t assume the same window.
• Permitted stay — 30, 60 or 90 days. How long you may remain once you’re in. The entry stamp is what counts, not the application.
• Number of entries. E-visas are issued multiple-entry, set from the itinerary you submitted. Check the actual document before any trip that hops out of Mozambique and back.
• Changed dates — you cannot amend. The portal FAQ is blunt: there is no date-amendment process, so a changed trip means a new e-visa. Book flights first, then apply.
• Pending is not approved. A payment receipt or an application reference number will not board you. Only the approval will.
• Staying with friends? Upload your host’s responsibility documents, not an unrelated hotel booking made to satisfy the form.

The digital arrival card

An arrival card is not your entry permission, and no third-party site can sell you one that is. This trips people up because search results are full of paid services offering a Mozambique digital arrival card — some of which are simply reselling, at a markup, a form you fill in for free.

The real process starts and ends at evisa.gov.mz. What you may also be handed is a paper card at the desk, especially at smaller airports like Vilanculos, asking for your flight, your address in Mozambique and how you’re leaving. That’s a formality on top of your approval, never a replacement for it.

Carry your first accommodation’s address and your travel details somewhere you can reach them without signal.

Visa requirements by passport

Check your exact passport country, not your continent or where you live. Neighbouring countries land in different groups all the time, and the EU is not a single category. These examples follow the portal eligibility table.

Mozambique visa for US citizens

US passports need an ETA for tourism or business stays of up to 30 days, applied and paid for online before travel. Longer than 30 days moves you to a full e-visa.

Mozambique visa for UK citizens

British passports need an ETA, applied and paid for online before travel. FCDO guidance asks for at least five working days’ lead time and printed confirmation, and says payment on arrival is not available.

Mozambique visa for Canadian citizens

Canadian passports need an ETA, up to 30 days, arranged online before travel. Older accounts of paying on arrival describe the pre-2026 system and no longer apply.

Mozambique visa for French and EU citizens

There is no single EU category — it splits. France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Ireland, the Netherlands, Denmark, Finland and Sweden need an ETA. Austria, Greece, Hungary, Poland, Romania and the other EU states not on that list need a full e-visa. Check your exact passport.

Mozambique visa for Australian and New Zealand citizens

Australian and New Zealand passports need a full e-visa, not an ETA — a longer process with more supporting documents. Apply through the portal’s tourist category and leave time for corrections.

How to apply

Applying for a Mozambique tourist e-visa requires the supporting documents listed on the official tourist page. Prepare this pack, then check the exact requirements for the category the portal assigns you:

• A passport valid for at least 6 months beyond your arrival date, with at least two blank pages.
• A recent passport-style photo — a colour image on a plain white or light background, head-and-shoulders, with a neutral facial expression.
• Proof of accommodation — a hotel booking confirmation, or (if you’re staying with friends or family) a notarised Termo de Responsabilidade plus a copy of your host’s ID.
• A return or onward flight ticket.
• Proof of funds — a recent bank statement showing you can cover the trip.
• The visa-fee payment — paid by card on the portal. Keep the receipt; you may be asked for it at the border.

Both the ETA and the e-visa go through the same portal. Here’s what the process actually looks like:

1. Register. Go to evisa.gov.mz and click Login or Register. Enter your email, get a passcode, sign up. Save your sign-in details securely so you can track the application later.

2. Start the application. Click Create Application (top-left). On the form, set:

   • Nationality: your passport country
   • Passport type: P (regular)
   • Passport type name: Normal
   • Visa type: Tourist
   • Duration: the requested period for your actual trip
   • Number of entries: follow the category and your actual itinerary; verify it again on approval.

3. Issuance location is the airport or border where you’ll enter Mozambique. Pick the wrong one and ask portal support how to correct it before travelling.

4. Fill in personal details. If multiple travellers, finish one application fully before starting the next. If a required field rejects your accurate details, contact portal support instead of inventing information. If it rejects your address, try typing it in a plain text editor first and pasting it in.

5. Upload documents. You’ll need:

   • A passport-style photo
   • Your passport bio page
   • A hotel booking confirmation — or, if you’re staying with friends or family, a notarised Termo de Responsabilidade plus a notarised copy of your host’s BI or passport
   • A return flight ticket
   • A recent bank statement

   The tourist page lists JPEG, PDF or PNG; follow the size limit shown at the actual upload step and use simple filenames. For each upload the form asks for Document Date, Document Number, and Issuing Authority — these are required even on documents that don’t officially have them. Use the document’s actual details; ask portal support if a required field does not apply — for a bank statement the issuing authority is your bank, and for a flight ticket it is your airline.

6. Pay. Use a payment method accepted by the portal. If a transaction appears pending, check the application status and bank record before trying again; contact support if payment and approval do not match.

7. Download and print. Track the reference through the official portal, check your email and spam folder, and print the approved PDF and payment confirmation. Review the passport details, dates, duration and entry conditions.

Allow at least five working days, and preferably longer. The portal FAQ quotes approximately five business days for a full e-visa, and FCDO asks for the same minimum on an ETA. Both are normal-conditions minimums rather than guarantees — and neither leaves room for the correction window below.

If your application is rejected

A preliminary rejection gives you five calendar days to fix it — then the application dies. This is the single most expensive detail on the portal, and almost nobody mentions it.

Here’s how it works, per the portal FAQ. If your documents are missing or wrong, you don’t get refused outright. You get a preliminary rejection email listing exactly what’s wrong, and five calendar days from the date of that email to upload corrections. Upload in time and your application carries on as normal. Miss the window and it is automatically rejected — at which point there’s no fixing it. You start a completely fresh application, and pay again, because the fee is not refunded.

Five calendar days, not working days. A rejection email landing on a Friday afternoon before a public holiday leaves you very little room.

So: apply from an email address you actually check, look in your spam folder, and don’t submit the application the week you fly. The portal notes this five-day window applies only to preliminary rejections — an outright visa refusal doesn’t come with one.

And if your dates change, you cannot amend. The FAQ is blunt about it: there is no date-amendment process, so you must obtain another e-visa. Book the flights first, then apply.

Documents not in Portuguese

Supporting documents in another language may need a sworn translator. The tourist e-visa page names the medical certificate and criminal record specifically, and requires that the translation be accurate and the translator competent to make it. A quick self-translation or a machine translation won’t do for those.

For an ordinary beach holiday this usually won’t apply — a tourist application asks for a bank statement, a booking and a return ticket, not a criminal record. It matters if the portal puts you in a category that requests them.

Travelling on two passports

Apply with the passport you will actually travel on. The portal confirms dual nationals can apply, provided the passport used is eligible under Mozambique’s rules — and its own first application step says to use the passport you’ll be carrying.

This matters more than it sounds, because the buckets on this page split by passport, not by person. A dual British-South African, for example, is looking at an ETA on the British passport and a visa-free 30-day entry on the South African one. Whichever you apply with is the one that has to be in your hand at the desk.

At the border

Whether you’re flying into Vilanculos, Maputo, or driving across from South Africa, the kit is the same. Get this together before you go and you’ll skip most of the friction at the desk.

• Passport valid for at least 6 months beyond your arrival date
• 2 blank pages in your passport
• Proof of onward/return travel (printed)
• Proof of accommodation (printed booking confirmation)
• Proof of funds (a recent bank statement or card that works at an ATM) — immigration can ask for this on arrival, even if you’re visa-free
• Yellow fever certificate if you’re arriving from a yellow-fever-endemic country (including transit)
• Printed approval and payment confirmation. Do not assume you can complete an unpaid ETA at the border.
• A pen, and your trip details within reach. Some airports — especially the smaller ones like Vilanculos — still hand out a paper card even if your ETA or e-visa is already approved. You’ll fill in your name, passport number, flight number, the date and way you’re leaving, the address where you’re staying, and similar basics. And it’s not just on the way in: they’ll usually make you fill out a near-identical departure card when you leave, asking for your onward destination and flight, so keep that pen handy for both ends of the trip. Having all of it on a saved note (not buried in your email) and a working pen in your pocket gets you out of the queue noticeably faster.

Before you leave the airport/border desk: make sure you’ve been handed your entry payment receipt and that your passport has been stamped. Ask for the receipt even if you didn’t pay on arrival — one is usually issued either way, and officers don’t always offer it unprompted. Keep it on you for the rest of the trip: immigration often asks for it again when you leave the country, and you’ll need it if you extend your visa. Photograph it and email yourself a copy as a backup.

Health and customs

Mozambique entry preparation includes health and customs checks as well as the visa category.

Do you need a yellow fever certificate?

Only if you’re arriving from a country with yellow fever transmission risk — including a transit stop there. Coming straight from Europe, North America or South Africa, you don’t need one.

What catches people is the transit leg: routing through Nairobi or Addis can trigger the requirement even though your trip started somewhere exempt. CDC and NaTHNaC differ on some of the details, so take your full routing to a travel clinic rather than just naming your home country. A first certificate becomes valid 10 days after vaccination — plan accordingly. See the health guide.

Malaria: prevention for everyone

Malaria is present across Mozambique, including the coast and the islands, and there is no vaccine you can rely on. Prophylaxis is a conversation with a travel-health clinician a few weeks before you fly, not something to sort at the airport.

Bite avoidance does the other half of the work — repellent, covered ankles at dusk, and the net if your room has one. Any fever during or after your trip needs urgent medical attention, even months later, and even if you took every tablet. Tell the doctor you’ve been to Mozambique.

Declaring cash at customs

Declare cash from USD 5,000, and from 10,000 meticais. The two government advisories disagree on the foreign-currency figure: the FCDO puts it at USD 5,000, the Canadian government at USD 10,000. Neither is the Mozambican customs regulation itself, so use the lower threshold and you are covered under either reading. Both agree on the 10,000-metical figure.

Keep the declaration receipt. And a threshold to declare is not permission to carry unlimited local currency — Canada’s advice separately warns that import and export of meticais is restricted, so plan your last-day spend rather than flying home with a wad of notes.

Children under 18

Every child needs their own passport and their own entry permission — and a birth certificate. This is the requirement families most often arrive without, and it is not waived for infants.

The pack for entering Mozambique:

• An unabridged birth certificate naming both parents. The short-form certificate many countries issue by default is not enough — order the long form well in advance, as it can take weeks.
• A notarised parental consent affidavit, no more than three months old, if the child travels with one parent or with neither. Both non-travelling parents must consent.
• Custody, guardianship or death documentation where one parent cannot consent.

Those come from current UK guidance; the official tourist e-visa page separately requires documents evidencing parental authority in the application itself. Confirm your exact pack with the consulate and your airline — airlines enforce this at check-in, so a missing certificate stops the trip before it starts.

If your route touches South Africa

South Africa runs its own strict under-18 documentation rules, and they apply separately. Most travellers to Vilanculos connect through Johannesburg, so this affects a lot of families.

What matters is the shape of your connection: staying airside is a different journey from collecting bags or overnighting, and only the latter puts you through South African immigration. Check official South African guidance and your airline’s document check — the Mozambique pack does not answer the transit question.

Other neighbours

On a road trip, every country you cross has its own child-documentation rules — on the way out as well as in. Eswatini, Zimbabwe and Botswana each set their own. Sort every consent letter and certified copy before you leave home; notarising documents mid-trip is slow and, in a small border town, sometimes impossible.

Driving in

Driving in means clearing two separate processes: one for you, one for the car. Your visa or ETA covers you as a passenger and says nothing about the vehicle — registration, ownership permission, licence, insurance and the customs procedure are all handled separately at the crossing.

What Mozambique requires at any border

Third-party insurance valid in Mozambique, your ownership and licence documents, two reflective triangles and two high-visibility vests. Those are the constants at any crossing, per FCDO road guidance. Ask your vehicle provider about the full equipment and marking rules for the car and any trailer.

If the car isn’t yours

You need written permission from whoever actually owns it — the rental company, the registered owner, or the finance provider if the car is financed. The letter has to match the vehicle, the country and your dates.

Check this before you book. Plenty of rental products don’t permit Mozambique at all, and finding out at the border is an expensive way to learn. If it looks awkward, renting inside Mozambique is often simpler.

Driving up from South Africa, specifically

Check the border’s current opening hours before you commit to a crossing — they vary by post and they are not all open late. Plan the day so you reach your accommodation in daylight; night driving is the thing to avoid on this route.

A South African policy usually does not cover you in Mozambique. Confirm third-party cover and, just as important, breakdown recovery — the recovery question is the one people forget until they need it.

From other countries

Check both sides of your chosen border, since the exit country has its own formalities. The self-drive guide covers the document folder, realistic route timings, fuel planning and breakdowns.

If the paperwork for taking your own car across is getting complicated, a rental picked up in Maputo or Vilanculos sidesteps most of it — and we do one-way drops on the coast.

How long you can stay

Your permitted stay is the number of days written on your entry stamp — nothing else. Not the validity of your e-visa, which is a separate two-month window for arriving, and not what a website tells you your nationality gets.

What each route allows:

• Visa-free — 30 days, or 90 for Botswana, Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania.
• ETA — 30 days.
• e-Visa — 30, 60 or 90 days, chosen when you apply.

Check the stamp before you leave the immigration desk. It is far easier to query a wrong date there than to explain an overstay on the way out. If you’ll want longer, start the extension conversation well before expiry — and don’t assume a quick hop over a border resets anything.

Extending your stay

It’s possible, but it’s not a casual errand. If you already know you want more than 30 days, the cleanest option is to apply for a 60- or 90-day e-visa before you fly — it costs more, but you keep your passport and avoid the paperwork. Extensions are a fallback, not a plan.

Eligibility: ask SENAMI or the consulate what extension is available for your actual permission. A border run is not a guaranteed substitute.

Where. Contact SENAMI to confirm the office handling your permission and whether you need an appointment. Do not travel to another town or hand over your passport based only on an old address list.

One wrinkle worth knowing before you go: the official portal’s tourist-visa page now directs e-visa holders to contact a Mozambican embassy directly in order to extend a stay, rather than describing an in-country route. Confirm the appropriate procedure with SENAMI before relying on the preparation list here — but if you are on an e-visa and an office pushes back, that portal wording is where the confusion comes from.

When. Contact the authority well before your permission expires — they often ask for corrections and you’ll want a buffer. Confirm opening hours, whether originals will be retained and the expected processing time.

Preparation pack to confirm with the office. The list below helps organise the enquiry; requirements and processing arrangements must be confirmed for the specific application.

• Your passport, plus a notarised photocopy of the bio page and the page with your entry stamp.
• Accommodation confirmations and any signed or stamped host letter the office requests. Ask whether it needs evidence from your first stay as well as your current address.
• Printed copies of your arrival and departure flights.
• Your original ETA or e-visa approval, plus the entry payment receipt you received at the airport or border.
• A letter requesting the extension, notarised.
• Your Boletim de Alojamento — this one is critical. See the next section for what it is and why you need it.

How to get things notarised. Documents are notarised at the Conservatória dos Registos e Notariado — a public notary office found in most towns. You hand over the document and ask for it to be carimbado (stamped). Confirm the fee, identification requirements and time needed before going.

On the day. Bring the requested originals and copies, and follow the office’s photograph requirements. Ask whether the office retains the passport, for how long and what receipt or temporary document it issues before planning any onward journey.

Cost: confirm the current extension and certification fees with the office before applying; an old MZN 650 estimate is not a current quote.

Boletim de Alojamento

The Boletim de Alojamento records where a foreign guest is staying. Articles 37–38 of the immigration regulation published by Mozambique’s embassy in France describe the guest record and the host’s reporting obligation. Hotels and private hosts are covered, as are non-resident foreigners staying in their own property.

At a hotel or lodge. Ask the front desk to confirm it is completing the required guest registration. The regulation permits hotel records to be communicated through lists or electronic systems, so not every guest receives the same paper slip. Ask for evidence you can retain if needed for later immigration enquiries.

Staying privately. Discuss registration with the host before arrival. Confirm the current receiving office, form and supporting documents with SENAMI; where migration services are absent, the published regulation provides for reporting to police or the local administration.

Timing matters for arrival and departure. The published regulation specifies five days for notifying accommodation and also for reporting the guest’s departure. Confirm the current procedure and deadline with the receiving authority; do not postpone this until an extension appointment.

A preparation pack for a private stay

Use this as an enquiry checklist, then follow the office’s current instructions:

• Guest’s original passport and copies of the identification and entry-stamp pages.
• Entry approval, payment evidence and arrival/departure details.
• Host’s identification, property address and the proof of address the office accepts.
• The completed guest-registration information, including the full name and nationality.
• Any host letter, signatures or additional copies requested by the receiving office.

Keep copies of what was submitted and any receipt or confirmation. Ask each subsequent host about its own reporting obligations. A first hotel’s registration does not automatically cover the remainder of the trip.

What’s changed

Mozambique’s entry system has been rewritten repeatedly since 2023, which is why so much advice online contradicts itself. Here’s the dated timeline of what actually happened:

• 29 December 2022 — Law No. 23/2022. The law governing the entry and stay of foreign citizens in Mozambique. The portal cites it as the reason submitting every required document is a legal obligation rather than a formality — it’s the statute underneath the whole application process.
• 31 March 2023 — Decree No. 10/2023. Abolished tourist visas for 29 countries and, under Article 4, created the legal basis for the ETA — an online pre-registration to be filed at least 48 hours before departure.
• 24 April 2025 — the 48-hour ETA pre-registration took effect for those 29 visa-exempt nationalities, run through the eVisa platform.
• 16 May 2025 — SENAMI suspended the ETA pre-registration after technical failures on the platform stopped travellers from submitting properly. Visa-free entry continued in the meantime; the underlying decree stayed in force.
• February 2026 — evisa.gov.mz relaunched, bringing the ETA and the e-visa back under one online portal — the system this guide describes.
• 20 August 2026 — the advance-payment rule spelled out. Updated FCDO guidance stated explicitly that the ETA must be approved and paid for online before travel, with at least five working days of lead time, and that payment on arrival is not available.

Because Decree No. 10/2023 never went away, expect the ETA to keep evolving. Always confirm the current rule on evisa.gov.mz before you travel.

Common questions

Where to go next

The paperwork’s the boring part. This is the trip you’re actually coming for. Most travellers clear immigration in Maputo — from there the beaches are a domestic flight or a long drive north, and our getting to Vilanculos guide compares every way of doing it. If you’d rather land with it already sorted, we arrange private transfers from Maputo and rental cars in Maputo, one-way drops on the coast included.

Still not sure?

Mozambique’s visa rules are a moving target. If your situation doesn’t fit cleanly into the four buckets above, or if the portal is giving you grief, send us a message on WhatsApp — we help guests through this every week. Tell us your passport country and your rough travel dates and we’ll point you at the right path.

Once you’re in, the rest is the easy part — that’s what we’re here for.

Last reviewed: 8 September 2026. Every entry category, country list and stay duration on this page was checked line by line against the official portal’s eligibility tables on that date. The system was last overhauled in February 2026 and the government continues to adjust it — always confirm on evisa.gov.mz before you travel. Legal basis: Law No. 23/2022 of 29 December 2022, which regulates the entry and stay of foreign citizens in Mozambique and which the portal cites as making submission of the required documents a legal obligation; and Decree No. 10/2023 of 31 March 2023 (Article 4), which established visa-free entry for 29 countries and the ETA. Sources: evisa.gov.mz (official), Serviço Nacional de Migração (SENAMI) 2026 statement that communicating foreign guests’ accommodation is obligatory for institutions and private citizens (video), US CDC — Mozambique (yellow fever and malaria), Government of Canada travel advice for Mozambique (currency declaration, entry requirements), IATA Travel Centre (airline-side entry rules), South African Department of Home Affairs (under-18 rules at SA borders), DriveMoz (SA road-trip checklists for vehicle papers and equipment), gov.uk travel advice for Mozambique.