Five items. That is the entire Cambodia eVisa document checklist for US citizens in 2026 — and three of them are already in your hand. No return flight, no hotel booking, no bank statement, no itinerary.

Five things: a US passport with at least 6 months of validity and one blank page, a recent passport-style photo (white background, neutral expression, no glasses), a clear scan of your passport bio page, a working email address, and a payment method. That is the entire list. You do NOT need a return flight ticket, hotel booking, bank statement, itinerary, vaccination record, or travel insurance. The Cambodia eVisa is one of the lightest application packs in Southeast Asia for Americans — most of the work is uploading what is already in your wallet.
Most Americans sitting down to apply for a Cambodia eVisa for the first time brace for a Vietnam-style document pile — a flight itinerary, hotel confirmations, two months of bank statements, an insurance certificate, the works. Cambodia asks for none of that. Five items, every one of which fits on your phone screen, and you are done. Three of the five are already in your hand right now.
Cambodia's eVisa stack was streamlined over the last two years, and the e-Arrival rollout pulled the bigger arrival questions — flight number, where you are staying, your customs declaration — into a separate form you file in the week before you fly. What is left in the visa application itself is genuinely just identity and payment. Cambodian Immigration treats the visa-fee transaction as your commitment, and collects the rest later.
This guide walks through the full list, the photo specs that cause most of the avoidable rejections, the passport details that catch out frequent travelers and recent name changes, and the separate e-Arrival step that runs alongside the visa. When you are ready, you can apply directly — most Americans finish the upload step inside three minutes. Our Cambodia visa for United States citizens hub pulls the cost, documents, and processing timeline into one place.
Five items. Three you already have in your hand, two you can sort in 90 seconds at your kitchen window. Here is the full list, in the order the application asks for it, with the specifics Cambodian Immigration enforces and the small mistakes that send a file back to your inbox for a fix.
Your current US passport, with at least 6 months of validity remaining from your planned date of entry into Cambodia, and at least one full blank page for the entry stamp. If your passport expires in October 2027 and you arrive in July, you are fine. If it expires in September and you arrive in July, you are not — the airline denies boarding at your US departure gate before you ever reach Cambodia. The 6-month rule is enforced by the carrier, not just at the Cambodian border. Our US passport 6-month rule guide breaks the counting down date by date.
Blank pages catch out frequent travelers. Cambodian Immigration stamps full clean pages, not strips at the edge of a page already carrying a Thai or Schengen stamp. If your book is busy, flip through and count the genuinely clean pages before you apply. Fewer than one full blank page means a renewal, not a quick fix — the State Department ended visa-page inserts back in 2016, so a full book needs a brand-new passport. Standard US renewal runs about 4 to 6 weeks in 2026, with expedited service roughly 2 to 3 weeks.
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The Cambodia e-Arrival Card is a separate step from your eVisa, and a small one — $5 USD verified through us, 14 fields, filed within 7 days before you fly. Here is exactly what that fee covers, why it is not bundled into your visa price, and the timing that keeps you moving at the gate.
The Cambodia e-Arrival Card is 14 fields across three sections, filed within 7 days before you land. Here is exactly what each field wants, in the order the form asks for it, plus the date-format slip that flags US travelers at the kiosk.
The Cambodia e-Arrival Card asks for 14 pieces of information across three sections — your identity, your flight and stay, and a short customs declaration. Here is exactly what each field wants and the four things to have in front of you before you start.
A recent passport-style photo, taken in the last 6 months, against a plain white or off-white background, sized as a 4×6 cm equivalent. Face fully visible, head centered, neutral expression — no smile, no teeth. No glasses, no hats, no head coverings except for religious reasons. Save it as a JPEG, ideally 600×600 pixels or larger. We accept phone photos taken against a white wall, which is how the large majority of American applicants do it. The full Cambodia eVisa photo requirements for Americans cover the size, background, and rejection triggers in detail.
Photo rejection is the single most common reason an American application loses a day. The auto-flags are smiles, glasses of any kind (even thin frames), shadows behind the head from artificial light, off-white or colored walls, hats, and resolution under 600 pixels. None of those are hard to avoid once you know the list — and a flagged photo is a free fix, not a fresh fee.
The remaining three items are quick. A clear scan or photo of your US passport bio page — both edges visible, no glare on the laminate, all the machine-readable text legible. A working email address, ideally a personal Gmail or Outlook account, since the approval letter is a PDF and corporate inboxes that block attachments are a common trap. And a valid payment method — we accept Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Discover, PayPal, Apple Pay, and Google Pay.

This is where the Cambodia eVisa parts ways with almost every other visa Americans apply for. The list of things you do NOT need is longer than the list of things you do. Travelers coming from an Indian e-Visa, a Vietnam eVisa, or a Schengen application are usually surprised — and a little suspicious — when they see what Cambodia skips.
The reason all of that is missing is straightforward. Cambodian Immigration treats the visa-fee transaction itself as the commitment — once you have paid for an eVisa, you have skin in the game. The bigger arrival picture (flight number, accommodation address, customs declaration) is collected separately through the e-Arrival Card in the week before you fly. The application stage just asks: who are you, can we see your face, and can you pay? If you are still wondering about onward travel and funds specifically, our note on onward tickets and proof of funds for US citizens settles it.

You do not need a drugstore photo counter, a passport-photo booth, or any special gear. A phone camera and a plain white wall is the setup the majority of American applicants use, and it produces a clean compliant photo every time when you follow a short routine. Most people do this in 90 seconds at a kitchen window.
Find a plain white wall — interior paint is ideal, but a closed white door or a white sheet pinned flat will do. Stand about a foot and a half from the wall, not pressed against it, so there are no shadows behind your head. Face a window where daylight comes in from the side, not directly behind you, so your face is lit evenly and the wall stays white. Mid-morning or mid-afternoon is best. Avoid late evening, when warm lamplight yellows the wall.
Use the phone's main rear camera, not the selfie camera, and hold it in portrait orientation at eye level. Get someone else to press the shutter if you can — arm's-length selfies distort facial proportions and the auto-flagger catches that. Look straight at the lens with a neutral expression. No smile, no teeth, no exaggerated serious face either. Just relaxed. Tuck your hair behind your ears if it covers your face, take the glasses off, and remove any hat. Take five or six shots and pick the best one.
Save the file as a JPEG, ideally 600×600 pixels or larger. iPhones and modern Android phones shoot in HEIC by default and at a far higher resolution than that, so you may need to convert to JPEG and crop to a square before upload. Do not edit, filter, or beautify the image — the auto-flagger looks for natural skin texture and rejects heavily smoothed photos. A plain, unfiltered, well-lit headshot clears the upbeat-selfie filter every time.

Cambodian Immigration needs to read every detail on your passport bio page — full name, passport number, date of birth, issue and expiry dates, and the machine-readable zone at the bottom. A clean phone-camera scan is fine; you do not need a flatbed scanner. The basics: flat surface, no glare, both edges of the page fully visible in the frame, all text legible.
Put the passport flat on a clean, plain, ideally dark surface — a wooden desk or a dark notebook works well, because contrast makes the page edges clearer for the upload validator. Use daylight from a side window, not the camera flash. Flash bounces straight back off the passport laminate and washes the page out. Hold the phone directly above the open passport, parallel to the page, at about a foot. Tap to focus on the text before you shoot.
If the laminate is reflecting light back into the lens, tilt the passport very slightly so the reflection moves off to the side — you only need a few degrees. Check the photo before you upload: can you read every letter of your name, every digit of the passport number, and the two lines of < character codes at the bottom? If yes, you are done. If anything is fuzzy, blown out, or cropped, retake. The most common rejection on this step is a corner of the bio page outside the frame, so leave a thumb-width of margin around all four edges.

Most Americans fit the standard eVisa box cleanly. A few situations need a closer look before you start, mostly around which passport you apply on and what name appears on the application.
US green-card holders on a foreign passport apply on the passport they hold, not on their permanent-resident status. A British, Indian, or Filipino citizen living in New York on a green card applies as a Brit, Indian, or Filipino — not as an American. The Cambodian eVisa system reads nationality from the passport, and your green card has no bearing on it. Your eligibility, fee, and processing rules follow the passport, not the residency.
Dual citizens (US plus UK, US plus Vietnam, US plus Ireland, and so on) should apply on whichever passport they plan to enter Cambodia with — and use exactly the same passport to exit. Switching mid-trip causes problems at the gate every time. The eVisa is tied to the passport number you applied with, full stop. For most US dual nationals, applying on the US passport is the simplest path because that is the book the airline checks at your US departure gate.
Minors and newborns each need their own Cambodia eVisa under their own passport. There is no family discount and no shared application. A US baby born last week, traveling with parents, needs a US infant passport first, then their own eVisa. The same five-item document checklist applies, with the same photo specs — yes, including a neutral-expression passport photo of a six-month-old, which is genuinely the hardest part of the application for new parents.
Name changes after marriage are the other common edge case. The name on the application must match your current passport machine-readable zone exactly — character for character, including middle names. If you married and your passport still shows your maiden name, apply in your maiden name. If you have already updated your passport, apply in your new name. Do not mix the two, and do not apply in the name on your driver license if it does not match the passport. Getting any of this wrong is one of the most avoidable reasons US applications get flagged.
A popular pairing for Americans — but all 7 land borders into Cambodia are closed.
Check Cambodia entry rules →The classic Indochina loop. Americans need a separate Vietnam eVisa.
See the entry points guide →The quieter third stop on the regional route for US travelers.
Confirm your documents →Where many Americans connect on the way through to Phnom Penh.
Plan the connection →Your destination — sort the five documents, then the eVisa, then the e-Arrival Card.
Start your eVisa →Five items, ten minutes, three business days. That is the entire Cambodia eVisa shape for Americans in 2026. Tourist eVisa $80 USD, Business eVisa $90 USD, both delivered as a printable PDF by email, both with free resubmission if Immigration flags a correction, both backed by US-timezone support. No return flight, no hotel booking, no bank statement, no itinerary. If you want the requirements laid out as a tick-box list to print, our Cambodia eVisa required documents checklist for US citizens does exactly that.
One reminder before you start. The visa is one form, the e-Arrival Card is a different form, and both are mandatory for every air arrival in 2026. The visa application happens now; the e-Arrival happens within 7 days before you fly. Americans who plan for both at the start avoid the most common 2026 trip-stopper at the kiosk. Note too that Phnom Penh now flies through Techo International Airport (KTI), which replaced the old airport code in September 2025 — your e-Arrival Card should reflect the airport you actually land at.
Next steps and related reading for Americans: get your documents ready, lodge your application when the five items are in hand, and use the hub above as your single canonical reference. Confirm the validity detail and skim the photo specs before you upload so the headshot clears on the first try.