Cambodia Tourist Visa vs Business Visa: Which One Americans Should Choose

The real difference, in one sentence

The Cambodia Tourist eVisa and the Business eVisa are nearly identical documents: both give a US citizen a 30-day single-entry stay, both are valid for 3 months from the date of issue, both are approved in 3 business days, and both arrive as a printable PDF in your inbox. On the application form they sit one dropdown apart. So the question almost every American asks — "which one do I actually need?" — comes down to a single distinction that the price tag barely hints at.

Here is that distinction. The Tourist eVisa (labeled Type-T) is a one-and-done entry permit: you arrive, you stay up to 30 days, you leave. It cannot be extended. The Business eVisa (labeled Type-E) covers the same 30-day arrival, but it is the only Cambodia eVisa that you can extend from inside the country — for one month, three months, six months, or a full year. That is the whole ballgame. You are not really choosing between "vacation" and "work." You are choosing between a stay that is locked at 30 days and a stay you can lengthen if your plans change.

This guide walks through both visa types in full — what each one costs, what each one covers, the November 2025 rule change that makes this choice matter more than it used to, and a plain decision tree so you can pick in under a minute. When you are ready, you can apply online in about ten minutes. For the complete picture of every entry rule, fee, and document, our Cambodia visa guide for United States citizens is the canonical reference.

Tourist eVisa vs Business eVisa, side by side

Both visas are issued as eVisas under Cambodia’s online system, so for a US citizen the application, the documents, and the arrival experience are the same right up to the moment you pick the type. The differences are narrow but they each matter for a specific kind of traveler. Here is the full comparison, laid out the way you will weigh it.

What is identical

The stay length is identical: 30 days from the day you enter Cambodia, single entry, for both types. The validity window is identical: 3 months from the date of issue, which is the deadline by which you must enter the country, not a measure of how long you can stay. The processing is identical: approved in 3 business days, delivered as a printable PDF by email. The document pack is identical: a US passport with at least 6 months of validity, a passport-style photo, a scan of your passport bio page, an email address, and a payment method. Nothing about the upload changes based on which type you select.

What is different

Three things change, and only three. First, the price: the Tourist eVisa is $80 USD all-in, the Business eVisa is $90 USD all-in. Second, extendability: the Tourist eVisa cannot be extended inside Cambodia, while the Business eVisa can be extended for 1, 3, 6, or 12 months without leaving the country. Third, intent: the Tourist eVisa is for leisure travel and visiting people, while the Business eVisa covers meetings, conferences, supplier visits, contract work, and anything an immigration officer would not file under "holiday." For the vast majority of American trips, those three differences resolve cleanly to one answer.

When the Tourist eVisa is the right call

For most American travelers, the Tourist eVisa is the obvious and correct choice. If your trip is sightseeing, beaches, temples, food, or visiting friends and family, and you will be in and out inside 30 days, the Type-T is exactly what it was designed for. Saving the $10 over the Business eVisa is fine — the Tourist eVisa is not a downgrade, it is simply the right tool for a defined leisure trip.

A typical Tourist eVisa trip looks like this: ten days split between Siem Reap for Angkor Wat and the coast at Sihanoukville or Kep, or a two-week loop through Phnom Penh, Battambang, and Kampot. You know roughly when you are flying home, your dates fit inside a month, and there is no scenario where you would want to stay past day 30. That is the Tourist eVisa traveler, and it covers the large majority of US visitors to Cambodia.

The Tourist eVisa also handles the gray-area trips that feel like they might be "business" but are not. Visiting your daughter who teaches English in Phnom Penh is tourism. Attending a friend’s wedding is tourism. A yoga retreat, a volunteer stint that is unpaid and informal, a scouting trip where you are not signing anything or being paid — all tourism. Cambodian Immigration reads "business" as paid or contractual activity, so unless money or a signed engagement is involved, the Tourist eVisa is correct. If you want the deeper breakdown of what the Type-T covers, our Cambodia Tourist visa (Type-T) guide for Americans walks through every included use.

The one thing the Tourist eVisa will not do is bend. It is 30 days, and at the end of those 30 days you leave. There is no in-country extension, no grace-period buffer beyond the strict overstay penalty, and — importantly — no automatic extension anymore. If there is any real chance you will want to stay longer, skip ahead to the next section before you commit to the Type-T.

When the Business eVisa is worth the extra $10

The Business eVisa is the right choice in two situations: when the purpose of your trip is work, or when your return date is genuinely uncertain. The first is about staying on the right side of immigration rules. The second is about buying flexibility for $10. Both are common enough among American travelers that the Type-E is far from a niche product.

On purpose: if you are attending meetings, sitting in on a conference, visiting a supplier or factory, doing paid consulting, inspecting an investment, or carrying out any contractual work, you want the Business eVisa. It is not a question of how long you stay — a two-day meeting trip still calls for the Type-E. An immigration officer who asks why you are visiting and hears "meetings with our distributor" expects to see a business visa, not a tourist one. Matching your visa type to your actual purpose keeps your entry and any future trips clean.

On flexibility: the Business eVisa is the only Cambodia eVisa that can be extended from inside the country, and that single feature is why many seasoned travelers default to it. If you are a remote worker who might fall in love with Kampot and stay three months, a retiree testing whether Cambodia suits you for a longer season, or anyone whose plans could realistically slip past 30 days, the Type-E lets you extend for 1, 3, 6, or 12 months without flying out and back. The $10 premium is cheap insurance against having to leave the country just to reset your stay. Our Cambodia Business visa (Type-E) guide for US citizens covers exactly when this pays off.

A practical rule the team uses: if you would be even mildly annoyed to be forced out of Cambodia on day 30, choose the Business eVisa. The $10 is rounding error against the cost of an unplanned border run or a fresh round-trip flight, and the Type-E removes the constraint entirely. For a defined two-week vacation you will never extend, that flexibility is wasted and the Tourist eVisa wins. For everything in between, the Business eVisa is the safer pick.

Why this choice matters more after November 2025

For years, this decision was lower-stakes than it is now, because the Tourist eVisa came with a fallback: a one-time automatic extension you could arrange to push your stay past 30 days. That fallback is gone. The tourist auto-extension ended in November 2025. As of 2026, the Tourist eVisa is a hard 30-day ceiling with no in-country path to stay longer — when it ends, you leave Cambodia and, if you want to return, apply for a fresh eVisa.

That rule change is the reason the Tourist-versus-Business decision deserves a real minute of thought rather than a reflexive "I am a tourist, so Tourist visa." Before November 2025, picking the cheaper Tourist eVisa and extending later was a viable plan B. Today it is not a plan at all. If you choose the Tourist eVisa and your plans change, your only options are to leave the country or to overstay and pay a daily penalty — neither of which is a position you want to negotiate from while you are already in Cambodia.

The Business eVisa absorbed all of that flexibility. It remains the only Cambodia visa with an in-country extension path, and after the tourist auto-extension ended, it became the default recommendation for anyone whose stay is not firmly capped at 30 days. If the Type-T and Type-E labels themselves are confusing you, our explainer on Cambodia Type-T vs Type-E visas for US citizens decodes exactly what those class codes mean on the form.

A 60-second decision guide

If you want to skip the reasoning and just pick, run your trip through these questions in order. The first one that matches is your answer.

• Are you doing any paid work, attending business meetings, a conference, or a supplier visit? Choose the Business eVisa (Type-E). Purpose decides this one regardless of trip length.
• Is there a real chance you will want to stay longer than 30 days? Choose the Business eVisa — it is the only one you can extend in-country, and the $10 buys you that option.
• Is your return date firmly inside 30 days and your trip purely leisure or visiting people? Choose the Tourist eVisa (Type-T). It is exactly what it is built for, and you save $10.
• Genuinely unsure between the two? Choose the Business eVisa. The extra $10 removes the only real risk — getting locked at 30 days with no way to extend — and you lose nothing if you end up not needing it.

That is the whole decision. For the overwhelming majority of American vacationers, the Tourist eVisa is right and the answer is simple. For anyone working, anyone unsure, or anyone who would resent being forced out on day 30, the Business eVisa is the safer $90 USD. If you would like the same logic as an interactive walk-through tailored to your trip purpose, our which Cambodia visa do I need guide for US citizens turns these questions into a step-by-step chooser.

Next steps and related reading for Americans: apply for your Cambodia eVisa when you have picked your type, browse the full list of Cambodia visa types for US citizens to see where Type-T and Type-E sit among every class, skim the FAQ on Cambodia visa types for quick answers, and use our glossary of Cambodia visa terms to decode any class code or acronym in this guide.