The Dubai Visa for Indians, 30 Days or 60
The most straightforward visa an Indian traveller can apply for — no interview, no biometrics, usually decided inside a week. Which is exactly why the details people get wrong are the expensive ones.
First: check whether you need to pay at all
Before anything else, check one thing. If you hold a valid US visit visa, a US green card, or a UK or EU residence visa — with at least six months of validity remaining — your Indian passport entitles you to a visa on arrival in the UAE.
That grants 14 days, extendable once for a further 14, for a service charge of around AED 253. Your passport must have at least six months' validity from the date you land.
A very large number of Indian travellers hold a US visa from an old trip and pay for a Dubai visa they did not need. It costs nothing to check. The catch is length: if you are staying more than four weeks, the paid tourist visa is still the right route.
What the tourist visa costs
| Visa | AED | Approx. INR | Processing |
|---|---|---|---|
| 30 days, single entry | 350 | ₹9,220 | 3–5 working days |
| 60 days, single entry | 580 | ₹15,280 | 3–5 working days |
These are indicative all-in costs including VAT and basic insurance, and they move a little between issuing channels. That is not vagueness on our part — the UAE does not sell tourist visas over a counter. Every tourist visa is sponsored: by an airline you have booked with, a hotel you are staying at, a UAE resident relative, or a licensed travel agency. The sponsor submits the application, and each sponsor prices its handling slightly differently.
Rupee figures move with the exchange rate. Anyone quoting you a dramatically lower price is quoting the government component and adding their charges later.
30 days or 60?
The honest answer for most holidays is 30. A typical Dubai trip runs five to ten days, and the extra AED 230 buys headroom nobody uses.
The 60-day visa earns its price in three situations: visiting family and staying several weeks; a business trip whose end date is not fixed; or travel that pairs Dubai with Abu Dhabi, Ras Al Khaimah or a longer regional loop. Both are single entry — leave the UAE and the visa is spent, even with days remaining.
The number on the visa counts from the date you enter, not the date it was issued — but the visa itself also has a validity window, typically 60 days, within which you must enter. Two separate clocks, and confusing them is how people arrive at an airport with a visa that expired unused.
A visa is not admission. As everywhere, the officer at Dubai immigration makes the final call. Carry your return ticket and hotel confirmation in your hand baggage, not buried in an inbox.
What you need to submit
The document list is short, and that is genuinely the case rather than a simplification: a clear colour scan of your passport's first and last pages with at least six months of validity, a recent photograph on a white background, a confirmed return or onward flight, hotel confirmation or a host's details, and a recent bank statement — usually three months — showing you can fund the trip.
Because nobody interviews you, the scans are the application. More UAE applications are delayed by a photograph with the wrong background or a passport page photographed at an angle than by anything about the traveller. Scan properly, in daylight, flat.
We publish a complete, current Dubai document checklist — the exact photo and scan specifications, what the bank statement has to show, and the sponsor questions that hold applications up. It is a ₹500 download, and included when we file on your behalf.
The things that actually go wrong
- Photo or scan quality — wrong background, glare, cropped edges, a page shot at an angle
- Name mismatches — the passport shows one name, the flight booking another; single-name passports need particular care
- Passport validity under six months at the date of entry, not the date of application
- A previous UAE overstay or unpaid fine — this follows the passport and is a routine reason for refusal
- No confirmed return flight, or a booking that cannot be verified
- Applying too early and letting the entry window lapse before you travel
UAE refusals rarely come with a reason. That is frustrating, and it is also why the preventable errors above are worth eliminating before submission rather than diagnosing afterwards.
Overstaying, and why it matters later
The UAE charges a daily fine for overstaying, payable before you are allowed to leave, and the incident is recorded against your passport. The fine is the smaller problem — the record is the larger one, and it surfaces years later when a routine application is refused with no explanation given.
If your plans change while you are there, extensions are available through the immigration authority before expiry. Applying for one is straightforward. Explaining an overstay to a future visa officer is not.
In closing
Dubai is the easiest major visa an Indian passport holder can apply for, and that ease makes people careless. Check whether your existing US or UK documents already cover you, scan your papers properly, pick the duration you will actually use, and watch both clocks on the visa. Do that and it is a formality of a few days.
If you'd rather not do this alone
Our desk arranges UAE tourist visas for Indian travellers — 30 or 60 day, documents checked before submission, sponsored and filed for you, usually issued within a week. We'll also tell you if your existing US or UK documents mean you should not be paying for one at all. Flights and hotels can be booked in the same conversation.
This guide is for general information and is not immigration advice. UAE entry rules, fees and eligibility change without notice. Always confirm current details with the Federal Authority for Identity and Citizenship (icp.gov.ae) or the Dubai GDRFA (gdrfad.gov.ae) before travelling. No agent can guarantee a visa approval — the decision rests solely with the immigration authority.