Cambodia Work Permit vs EB Visa for Americans: The Two-Document System Explained

Document two: the MLVT work permit — your right to work

The second document is the work permit, issued by the Ministry of Labour and Vocational Training — MLVT. This is the document that authorizes you to be employed in Cambodia. It exists entirely separately from your immigration status. The work permit answers a different question than the EB visa: not "can you be here?" but "can you legally hold a job here?"

The work permit is required for foreign nationals in salaried employment with a Cambodian-registered employer. In practice, that means if a Cambodian company is paying you, the company is legally expected to have you on a work permit, and the obligation falls on both the employer and the employee. Cambodia has steadily tightened enforcement since 2023, and the MLVT runs an online system (often referenced as the FWCMS, the Foreign Workers Centralized Management System) that employers use to register foreign staff. The 2026 picture is more documented and more enforced than the loose, paper-era reality many older expat guides still describe.

The critical quirk Americans need to know is the renewal date. The work permit runs on a calendar year and expires on 31 December, no matter when in the year you obtained it. Get a work permit in October, and it still expires that 31 December — you renew it for the following full year in the early-year renewal window (typically the first quarter). This is completely independent of your EB visa extension date, which runs on its own 1, 3, 6, or 12-month clock from whenever you extended. The two documents almost never expire on the same day, and tracking both calendars is the single most common long-stay headache.

Whether you personally need a work permit depends on what you are actually doing in Cambodia, and this is where a lot of Americans over- or under-estimate their obligation. A salaried employee of a Cambodian company clearly needs one. A remote worker paid by a US employer into a US account is a genuinely grayer case — our detailed look at whether American remote workers need a Cambodia work permit walks through exactly where the line sits in 2026 and why the answer is not the obvious one.

How the two documents actually fit together

The cleanest way to picture the two-document system is as a foundation and a layer. The EB visa is the foundation — your legal presence in the country. The work permit is the layer that sits on top of it — your legal employment. You build the foundation first, then add the layer. You cannot have a meaningful work permit without underlying immigration status, but you absolutely can have immigration status (the EB visa) without a work permit.

The standard sequence for Americans

For the great majority of US citizens, the order runs like this. First, apply for the Business eVisa online before you fly — $90 USD, 3 business days, printable PDF. Second, enter Cambodia on that eVisa and use your initial 30 days to get set up: housing, a local bank where relevant, and a signed employment arrangement if you are taking a job. Third, extend the EB visa in-country through an agent to cover the length of your stay (commonly 6 or 12 months). Fourth, once you have a Cambodian employer in place, the employer and you arrange the MLVT work permit on top.

1. 1
   Apply for the Business eVisa online

   Before you fly, lodge the Business eVisa (Type-E): $90 USD all-in, approved in 3 business days, delivered as a printable PDF.

2. 2
   Enter and use your initial 30 days

   Arrive on the eVisa for an initial 30-day stay and get set up: housing, a local bank where relevant, and a signed employment arrangement if you are taking a job.

3. 3
   Extend the EB visa in-country

   Through a Cambodian immigration agent, extend for 1, 3, 6, or 12 months — most long-stay Americans take the 6 or 12-month extension.

4. 4
   Arrange the MLVT work permit

   Once a Cambodian employer is in place, you and the employer file the work permit with the Ministry of Labour and Vocational Training, layered on top of your stay.

5. 5
   Track two renewal clocks separately

   The work permit always expires 31 December; your EB extension runs on its own 1, 3, 6, or 12-month clock — set a reminder the day each is issued.

That sequence is why so many Americans legally hold only the EB visa for their first few months. You frequently land, settle, and extend your stay well before the work-permit paperwork is filed — especially if you arrive to look for work rather than with a contract already signed. There is nothing wrong with that order; it is the normal path. The work permit catches up once the employment is real and registered.

The mismatch that catches people out

The trap is assuming the two documents move together. They do not. Your EB extension might be a 12-month run starting in May 2026 and expiring in May 2027. Your work permit, obtained in that same May, still expires on 31 December 2026 and needs renewing in early 2027 for the next calendar year. So in a single 12-month stay you may renew the work permit once on the labor calendar while your EB visa quietly keeps running on its own. Two clocks, two ministries, two renewal actions. Set two calendar reminders the day each document is issued.

Costs, responsibilities, and who files what

The EB visa cost is clean and known up front. The Business eVisa is $90 USD all-in, approved in 3 business days and delivered as a printable PDF by email — that is the figure you control and pay before you fly. The in-country EB extension is a separate cost arranged through a Cambodian immigration agent once you arrive, and agent pricing fluctuates with the local market, so we do not quote a fixed figure; as a working guide, the 6-month and 12-month extensions deliver the best value per month of stay.

The work permit is a different cost again, with two parts: an MLVT government fee for the permit and the associated health-check requirement, plus the handling cost if an agent or your employer files it for you. Because the work permit is tied to a Cambodian-registered employer and filed through the labor ministry system, the employer is normally the party that initiates and often pays for it — many formal Cambodian employers treat the work permit as their administrative responsibility for foreign staff. Always confirm in writing who is filing and who is paying before you start a job; it is the most common point of confusion in a Cambodian employment offer for an American.

A practical division of labor that holds for most Americans: you own the EB visa entirely — you apply online, you extend it, it is your document tied to your passport. The work permit is a shared responsibility with your employer, often employer-led, because it is fundamentally a record of legal employment rather than a personal travel document. Keep your own copies of both regardless of who files them, and never assume an employer has handled the work permit without seeing the approval yourself.

On the renewal cadence specifically: the EB visa side is the one you will touch most often, and how often you renew depends on which extension length you took. Our comparison of the 6-month vs 12-month EB extension lays out the renewal rhythm and the cost-per-month math, which is the practical lever most long-stay Americans use to keep the total spend down.

Common American scenarios — and the pitfalls

The two-document system plays out differently depending on what you are actually doing in Cambodia. Here are the situations we see most often among US citizens, mapped to which documents they realistically need.

• Salaried job with a Cambodian company — you need both. EB visa for the stay, MLVT work permit for the employment. The employer should be filing the work permit; confirm it in writing before day one.
• Remote worker paid by a US employer into a US account, staying 6–12 months — you definitely need the EB visa for the stay. The work permit is the gray area; the safest read in 2026 is covered in our remote-worker guide, but you are not a salaried employee of a Cambodian company, which is the distinction that matters.
• Sabbatical, retirement reconnaissance, or a long non-working stay — EB visa only. No employment means no work-permit obligation. You build the foundation and never add the layer.
• Setting up your own Cambodian company and paying yourself — you need both, and the work permit follows the registered company. This is the most paperwork-heavy path and the one where professional handling pays for itself.
• Short business trip under 30 days — neither extension nor work permit. The base Business eVisa alone covers a meetings-and-conferences trip inside the initial 30 days.

The biggest pitfall is the order-of-operations mistake: arriving on a Tourist eVisa because it is $10 cheaper, then discovering you cannot extend it or layer a work permit onto it. The tourist visa is a dead end for working or long-staying — it caps at 30 days, it cannot be extended since the November 2025 change, and a work permit cannot rest on it. If there is any chance your trip involves work or a stay over 30 days, start on the Business eVisa. Switching visa class in-country is not supported, so the only fix for a wrong start is to exit Cambodia and re-enter on the correct visa.

The second-biggest pitfall is the calendar mismatch we covered earlier — letting the work permit lapse past 31 December because your EB visa is still valid and you assumed they renewed together. They do not. An expired work permit while you are still working is an enforcement risk even if your immigration status is spotless. Track both dates separately from the day each is issued.

Getting started: the EB visa is your first move

Whatever your long-stay or work plan in Cambodia, the practical first step is the same and it is the one you can do today, before you fly: apply for the Business eVisa. It is the foundation document, it is the only thing that legally gets you into the country and lets you stay past 30 days, and everything else — the in-country EB extension and, later, the MLVT work permit — builds on top of it. $90 USD all-in, approved in 3 business days, delivered as a printable PDF by email, with free resubmission if Immigration flags a correction and US-timezone support if you have questions.

On arrival, the entry routine is the same as any Business eVisa traveler. Print two copies of the approval PDF — one for entry, one for exit — and carry your US passport with at least 6 months validity and a blank page. Open airports for US arrivals are KTI (Phnom Penh — the new Techo International Airport, which replaced the old PNH on 9 September 2025), SAI (Siem Reap-Angkor), and KOS (Sihanoukville). Overland entry is realistic only from Vietnam or Laos; all seven Thailand-Cambodia land borders have been closed since June 2025, so a Bangkok-overland plan does not work in 2026.

When the immigration officer asks the purpose of your visit, answer honestly — "long-stay business," "remote work for a US employer," or "starting a job in Phnom Penh" are all standard answers the Business eVisa explicitly supports. The work permit and EB extension are arranged later, in-country; none of that happens at the airport. The US Department of State publishes current Cambodia entry and local-conditions guidance that is worth a five-minute read before you fly.

Next steps and related reading for US citizens: apply for your Cambodia eVisa when you are ready to lodge, bookmark the Cambodia visa for United States citizens hub as the single canonical reference, read how the EB visa extension works for the in-country stay side, and check whether American remote workers need a work permit before you assume the answer.