Returning Aussie to Cambodia: Is the Arrival Flow Any Faster on Your Third Trip?

Where the real time saving comes from

If the official touchpoints do not move faster on trip three, the airport itself does. KTI is a sprawling new terminal — opened September 2025 — with multiple arrivals lanes, three baggage carousel banks, and a long walk from the immigration desk to the taxi pickup point. First-time arrivals spend real minutes reading overhead signs, working out which way the SIM stalls are, finding the ATM that dispenses both USD and Riel, and queueing at the official taxi desk. Returning travellers walk straight through. Twenty to thirty minutes saved end-to-end is realistic, with nothing to do with the visa system.

The specific things returning Aussies do faster

• Walking to the correct immigration lane — KTI has separate channels for Cambodian nationals, ASEAN, and foreign passports, and the foreign-passport lanes do not always queue evenly. Returning travellers know which one moves.
• Heading straight to the SIM stall that takes Australian credit cards (one of the four counters does not — first-time travellers find that out by trying the wrong one).
• Knowing the ATM at the south end of the arrivals hall dispenses Riel and USD with the lowest fee — first-time travellers usually use the first ATM they see, which has a higher fee.
• Walking past the official taxi desk to the ride-share pickup point, which is faster and cheaper for the KTI to Phnom Penh run.
• Having the accommodation address pre-loaded in their phone to show the driver, in Khmer script, rather than reading it off a printed PDF in the back of the cab.

None of these are visa system advantages. They are airport familiarity advantages, and they only accrue from actual time at KTI, SAI or KOS. A traveller on their fifth trip who has never paid attention to the airport layout still spends the same 20 minutes navigating that a first-time arrival does. The returning-traveller upside is earned, not granted.

What stays exactly the same on trip three

It is worth being explicit about the things that do not move faster on a third or fourth trip, because Aussies often expect them to. The Cambodia eVisa application takes the same 3 business days. The form is the same. The pricing is the same: $80 USD all-in (~$122 AUD) for the Tourist eVisa and $90 USD (~$137 AUD) for the Business. The 6-months-from-entry passport validity rule is checked the same way. The face-match algorithm on the photo is no kinder to returning travellers than to first-timers.

The e-Arrival 7-day window is the same. The 14-field form is the same. The Australian airline gate check is the same — Qantas, Virgin, Singapore Airlines, AirAsia and Cathay all check the eVisa PDF and the e-Arrival confirmation against your passport, with no special treatment for repeat travellers. The Cambodian Immigration desk asks the same questions and stamps the same entry. The Tourist eVisa is still single-entry. The 30-day stay cap is still hard.

If you want the full Type T versus Type E comparison before deciding which Cambodia visa to apply for on your next trip, the detailed visa type comparison for Australians lays out every difference. The multi-entry option, only available on the Business eVisa class via in-country extension, is covered in the multi-entry guide for Australians.

Putting the realistic picture together

The honest summary for an Aussie on their third Cambodia trip: the official system does not speed up for you. The visa is the same product, processed in the same window, at the same price. The immigration desk does not have a returning-visitor lane. The e-Gate trial does not include Australian passports yet. The e-Arrival form is still 14 fields, with about 5 minutes saved by autosave on two of them.

Where you do save time is on the parts of the journey that depend on familiarity rather than paperwork. You know the KTI layout. You know which SIM stall takes your card. You know where the ATM is. You walk straight to the right immigration lane. Apply fresh for your eVisa — approved in 3 business days, delivered as a printable PDF by email — file the e-Arrival inside the 7-day window, and the rest of the time saving comes from you. The country pillar at do Australians need Cambodia visa is the single best place to confirm the visa choice before you fly.

Next steps and related reading for Australians: apply for your Cambodia eVisa when you are ready to lodge, bookmark our Cambodia visa hub for Australian citizens as the single canonical reference, skim the FAQ on Cambodia visa after approval for quick answers, and use our glossary of Cambodia visa terms to decode any acronym in this guide.