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Updated February 2023

Effective 13 December, travellers in the UAE will have to first exit the country before being able to apply for a visit visa extension.

According to travel agents based in the United Arab Emirates, an extension of the visit visas will no longer be possible from within the country. Instead, they will be required to fly out from the UAE and then apply for a visa extension.

The UAE visit visa extension rules had been previously relaxed due to COVID-19. But now that normalcy has returned, UAE’s immigration department has decided to bring procedures back to the pre-pandemic norms.

As of now, no official confirmation about the new visa extension rule has been provided by the Federal Authority for Identity, Citizenship, Customs and Ports Security (ICP), but visa extension applications made from within the country have reportedly started being rejected.

This update follows the Federal Authority for Identity, Citizenship, Customs and Ports Security’s (ICP) announcement in November that visa extension applications can now be made directly through the government’s 24-hour website and mobile app, in a step meant to simplify the process.