Cambodia Business eVisa Processing Time for Americans

Is the Business eVisa slower than the tourist eVisa?

No. The Cambodia Business eVisa and the tourist eVisa are both approved in 3–5 days. There is no separate slow lane for business applications, no extra interview, and no additional review step that adds days to a Type E file the way some other countries handle their business categories.

The confusion comes from the price. The tourist eVisa is $80 USD all-in and the Business eVisa is $90 USD all-in, and travelers naturally assume the extra $10 buys a longer, more thorough process. It does not. The two visas are different classes — the tourist eVisa is for sightseeing and short visits, the Business eVisa (Type E) is the visa you need if you are attending meetings, scoping a supplier, working a conference, or doing anything that crosses the line from tourism into business activity. The fee reflects the visa category and the longer-term extension rights the Type E unlocks once you are in-country, not the processing speed.

In practice, that means your visa-class decision should be driven entirely by what you are doing in Cambodia, never by which one is faster. They are the same speed. Pick the Business eVisa because you are there for business, not because you are in a hurry — being in a hurry changes nothing about the queue.

If you are still deciding which visa you actually need, the Business eVisa cost guide for Americans breaks down where the $90 USD goes and what the Type E gives you that the tourist eVisa does not. The price gap is small and the wrong-visa fix is far more expensive than the difference, so it is worth getting right before you apply.

What can push your Business eVisa past 3–5 days

3–5 days is the standard, and the overwhelming majority of clean Business eVisa files land inside it. The cases that run long almost always trace back to something fixable on the application itself, not to a backlog in Cambodia. Here is what actually adds time, in order of how often we see it.

• A flagged photo. The single most common cause. A smile, glasses, an off-white background, or resolution that is too low gets the photo bounced for a correction — and the clock pauses while it waits for your replacement. Fix it the same day and you usually lose nothing.
• A passport scan that cannot be read. Glare on the laminate, a cropped corner, or a blurry machine-readable zone forces a retake. The file cannot proceed until every line is legible.
• A name or date that does not match the passport. The application data has to match your passport exactly, character for character. A mismatch flags the file for a correction before it can be approved.
• Submitting right before a Cambodian public holiday. The three working days simply pause across the holiday. Khmer New Year in April and Pchum Ben in autumn are the two big clusters that catch US travelers off guard.
• A weekend submission. Not a delay so much as a misread — a Friday application has its first real working day on Monday. The visa is not slow; the calendar just ate two days.

The reassuring part for business travelers is that none of these are billed twice. If Immigration flags a correction, the resubmission is free — you fix the photo or rescan the passport and the file goes back into the queue at no extra cost. To see exactly what each application field looks like and avoid the flags in the first place, follow our step-by-step guide to applying for the Cambodia Business eVisa. Getting the file clean on the first pass is the only real lever you have on speed.

How far ahead of your trip to apply

Apply at least 5 to 7 days before your departure. 3–5 days is the processing window, but you want a buffer on top of it so that if a photo or passport scan gets flagged, you have room to correct it without your approval sliding past your flight date. Business travelers on fixed meeting schedules should treat this buffer as non-negotiable.

There is no benefit to applying months early, and a small reason not to. The Business eVisa is valid for 3 months from the date of issue, and the single 30-day stay has to fall inside that window. If you apply too far ahead of a trip that keeps moving, you can burn validity before you even land. For most US business travelers, the sweet spot is one to two weeks out: comfortably clear of the three-business-day window and the holiday risk, but well inside the 3-month validity.

If your trip lands during or just after Khmer New Year (mid-April) or Pchum Ben (late September into October), add several days to your buffer. Cambodian government offices effectively close around these holidays, and a three-business-day window can stretch to a calendar week or more simply because the working days are not there to count. The fix is not a rush service — it is applying earlier.

Once your eVisa is sorted, remember it is only half the entry requirement for air arrivals in 2026. The Type E visa class itself is worth understanding before you travel, since the Business eVisa for US citizens guide covers what you can and cannot do on it, and how the in-country extension path works if your engagement runs past 30 days.

Putting your timeline together before you apply

3–5 days, one printable PDF, $90 USD all-in. That is the entire Cambodia Business eVisa processing shape for US citizens in 2026. The visa is no slower than the tourist eVisa, the higher price buys a different visa class rather than a different queue, and the only real lever you have on speed is submitting a clean file with a buffer ahead of your flight.

Count your three days as working days in Cambodia, not US calendar days. Skip the submission day, skip weekends, and skip Cambodian public holidays. Apply 5 to 7 days out — more if your trip brushes Khmer New Year or Pchum Ben — and keep your photo, passport scan, and application details clean so nothing gets flagged for a correction. Do that, and the three-business-day promise is exactly what it says.

Next steps and related reading for US business travelers: apply for your Cambodia Business eVisa when your trip dates are set, read the step-by-step Business eVisa application guide to get every field right the first time, compare the processing windows across visa types in our Cambodia visa processing time guide for US citizens, and check where your $90 goes in the Business eVisa cost guide for Americans.