S. Korea: will remove visa fees for group travelers from six countries, including India

Rekha Prajapati "Journalist"December 31, 2025

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S. Korea: The finance minister said on Wednesday that South Korea would continue to forgo visa processing costs for group travelers from six nations, including China, for an extra six months.

S. Korea

The fee exemption for C-3-2 visas, which was initially scheduled to expire on Wednesday, would extend until the end of June of the next year under the proposal revealed by Finance Minister Koo Yun-cheol, according to Yonhap news agency.

China, India, Vietnam, the Philippines, Indonesia, and Cambodia are the six nations that are included by the expansion.

“To maintain momentum in inbound tourism” is the strategy, according to Koo. The current C-3-2 visa processing cost is 18,000 won (US$12.46).

As the nation’s tourist industry continues to rebound to pre-pandemic levels, the number of international visitors to South Korea increased significantly in November, up 17.3% from a year earlier, according to official figures.

The Korea Tourism Organization (KTO) reports that around 1.6 million international visitors came in November, up from 1.36 million the previous year and 9.6% more than the same month in 2019, prior to the COVID-19 outbreak.

With 378,000 arrivals, China continued to be the top source of tourists, followed by Japan (363,000), Taiwan (158,000), the United States (133,000), and the Philippines (60,000), according to Yonhap news agency.

Japanese tourist arrivals increased 40.4% over the same time in 2019, while the number of Chinese visitors rebounded to almost 75% of 2019 levels.

According to the KTO, 17.42 million international visitors visited South Korea between January and November, up 15.4% from the same time last year and 8.6% from 2019 levels. About 5.09 million, or 29.2 percent, of the total number of visitors were from China.

This year, the Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism predicted that the number of international tourists will reach 18.7 million, approaching the landmark 20 million threshold and establishing a new record.