The official Sri Lanka ETA costs $50 for most nationalities. You apply directly at eta.gov.lk, Sri Lanka’s Department of Immigration and Emigration portal, and there’s no agent, no service tier, and no reason to pay more. Scam sites charge up to $139 for that same form, and right now, a genuine policy change is making the confusion worse than usual.

Sri Lanka’s Department of Immigration and Emigration has named specific fraudulent domains in public warnings. So have multiple embassies. The High Commission of Sri Lanka in Pakistan, the Embassy of Sri Lanka in Jakarta, and the High Commission of India in Colombo have each published advisories pointing applicants exclusively to eta.gov.lk, a level of coordinated warning that only happens when a scam has been running long enough, and successfully enough, to justify three separate governments saying the same thing.

Then, on May 25, 2026, Sri Lanka made the ETA free for nationals of 40 countries. Which sounds like good news (it is) but also means a chunk of travelers researching Sri Lanka right now are seeing conflicting prices ($0, $20, $50, $139) across different websites, with no easy way to tell which number applies to them. That confusion is exactly the gap scam sites are built to exploit.

Quick Facts: Sri Lanka ETA 2026

Detail	Info
Official portal	eta.gov.lk
Official cost (most nationalities)	$50 USD (tourist)
Official cost (other SAARC countries)	$20 USD (tourist)
Official cost (40 eligible countries)	Free as of May 25, 2026
Stay allowed	30 days, double entry (standard); free ETA also 30 days, double entry
Processing time	Typically 24–72 hours
What scam sites charge	Up to $139
Named fake portals	eta.org.lk, srilankavisa.org.lk, e-visa.org.lk, srilankavisa.lk, go-sri-lanka.com, srilanka-visaonline.com, srilankaetavisa.com, srilanka-etaonline.com
Embassy warnings issued	Sri Lanka High Commission in Pakistan, Embassy of Sri Lanka in Jakarta, High Commission of India in Colombo
Official government domain	Ends in .gov.lk, not .lk, .com, .org, or .net alone

In one sentence: Sri Lanka’s ETA is $50 (or free for 40 nationalities since May 2026) at eta.gov.lk. At least eight fake portals named in official warnings charge up to $139 for the identical form.

What Is the Sri Lanka ETA?

The Electronic Travel Authorization is Sri Lanka’s pre-arrival clearance, required of nearly every foreign visitor before boarding a flight. It replaced the older visa-on-arrival process, and it’s administered by the Department of Immigration and Emigration through the eta.gov.lk portal.

The form itself isn’t complicated: passport details, travel dates, a declared purpose of visit, payment, submit. Most applications clear in 24 to 72 hours. What complicates it is the pricing structure: three tiers depending on your passport, plus a fourth tier added a few months ago that removes the fee entirely for a specific list of countries.

Sri Lanka ETA pricing, as of August 2026:

• Non-SAARC nationalities (this covers most travelers, including the US, UK, and most of Europe when not on the free list): $50 tourist, $55 business
• Other SAARC countries (Bangladesh, Bhutan, Afghanistan): $20 tourist, $30 business
• 40 eligible nationalities: Free, effective May 25, 2026
• Transit ETA: Free for everyone, regardless of nationality

That’s four different correct prices depending entirely on which passport you’re holding. It’s a genuinely confusing system for scam sites to exploit: a traveler who sees “$0” on one page and “$139” on another has no obvious way to know which is real without checking their own eligibility first.

The May 2026 Policy Change That Created a Fresh Opening

Sri Lanka’s Parliament approved the free-ETA regulation on May 7, 2026, and it took effect May 25, 2026, waiving the tourist ETA fee entirely for nationals of 40 countries, including the US, UK, Canada, Australia, most of the EU, China, and India, for a 30-day, double-entry stay. It’s a genuine tourism push, not a scam-adjacent gimmick, and VisasNews reported the scheme runs for at least a year with a review at the six-month mark to decide whether it continues.

Here’s the part that matters for this post: travelers who paid before May 25 don’t get refunds, full stop. And travelers applying now, in August 2026, are hitting search results built for the old $50 flat rate, plus a wave of fake sites that haven’t updated (or don’t want to), still showing an inflated total regardless of what your passport actually qualifies for.

If you’re American, British, Canadian, Australian, or from most of the EU, your Sri Lanka ETA should cost you nothing right now. If a site is asking you for $50, $89, or $139, that’s your first sign something’s off. Check your eligibility on the official fee schedule before paying anyone anything.

Multiple Governments Have Named the Same Fake Sites

Sri Lanka’s Department of Immigration and Emigration, through the High Commission of Sri Lanka in Pakistan, published a formal warning naming a list of unauthorized ETA websites and directing applicants to eta.gov.lk exclusively. The advisory doesn’t hedge — it states plainly that travelers should be “strongly advised to use only the official Government of Sri Lanka ETA website.”

The Embassy of Sri Lanka in Jakarta has separately urged travelers to apply only through the official ETA site to avoid the same scam pattern, and the High Commission of India in Colombo issued its own advisory to Indian nationals listing unauthorized domains and pointing exclusively to eta.gov.lk.

Named across these warnings: eta.org.lk, srilankavisa.org.lk, e-visa.org.lk, srilankavisa.lk, go-sri-lanka.com, srilanka-visaonline.com, srilankaetavisa.com, and srilanka-etaonline.com. Some of these sites have been operating for years. Tripadvisor’s Sri Lanka forum has threads on this exact scam going back the better part of a decade, which tells you the takedown effort hasn’t kept pace with how fast these domains can be replaced.

This is the same playbook running across the region. Egypt’s fake eVisa portals, Cambodia’s third-party sites, and Vietnam’s scam ecosystem all follow the identical structure: buy search ads above the government portal, clone the look, charge triple or quadruple the real fee.

How the Scam Actually Works

The mechanics aren’t sophisticated, which is part of why they’re durable. A site like go-sri-lanka.com or srilanka-visaonline.com buys ad placement for terms like “Sri Lanka ETA,” “Sri Lanka visa online,” and “Sri Lanka entry requirements 2026.” It loads with government-style seals and a form that mirrors eta.gov.lk field for field: passport number, nationality, travel dates, arrival details.

You submit it. The payment page shows a number that has nothing to do with your actual fee tier: sometimes $89, sometimes $99, sometimes reportedly as high as $139, regardless of whether you’d have qualified for the $20 rate or paid nothing at all under the new free-ETA rules.

From there, two outcomes. Best case, the site takes your data, submits it to the real eta.gov.lk on your behalf, pays the actual government fee, and pockets the rest — you get a valid ETA, but your passport number and travel details passed through a private server with no accountability to you. Worse case, the confirmation you receive exists only in the scam operator’s own system, never touches Sri Lanka’s immigration database, and fails verification when your airline checks it at boarding.

How to Apply at eta.gov.lk

The only site that issues a valid Sri Lanka ETA is eta.gov.lk. Type it directly. Confirm .gov.lk sits in the address bar before you enter a single passport digit. That’s Sri Lanka’s government-only domain extension, the same role .gov plays for US federal sites.

The application:

1. Go to eta.gov.lk directly, not through a sponsored search result, not through a link in an email.
2. Check the current fee schedule for your nationality before starting. If you’re from one of the 40 eligible countries, your tourist ETA should be free.
3. Select your visa category (tourist, business, or transit) and enter passport details exactly as printed: name, number, nationality, expiry date.
4. Enter travel dates and accommodation details for your first days in Sri Lanka.
5. Pay the correct fee for your category: $50, $20, or $0, never anything beyond that plus standard card processing.
6. Submit and wait. Most approvals land within 24 to 72 hours by email.

Download the approval as a PDF the moment it arrives, and keep a copy accessible offline. Airlines check this document at check-in, and a dead phone battery at the counter isn’t the moment to discover you only saved it as an email link.

Timing

Apply at least a week before departure to leave room for a resubmission if something in your application doesn’t match your passport exactly. The ETA is generally valid for a set window from approval, so applying too far in advance of a trip that’s still months out just means a second application later. Do it once you’re within a reasonable window of actual travel, not the moment you book flights.

Who Qualifies for the Free ETA?

Is Sri Lanka’s ETA free for US citizens in 2026?

Yes, US passport holders are among the 40 nationalities eligible for the free 30-day, double-entry tourist ETA, effective for applications submitted on or after May 25, 2026. The list also includes the UK, Canada, Australia, most EU member states, China, Japan, India, Malaysia, Singapore, and the UAE, among others. Anyone outside that list still pays the standard $50 (non-SAARC) or $20 (other SAARC) tourist fee. Check the current list on eta.gov.lk before applying, since eligibility is defined by the government portal and can be adjusted at the six-month review point built into the policy.

The One Habit That Prevents This Entirely

Sri Lanka’s government ETA domain ends in .gov.lk. Not .lk on its own. Not .org.lk, .com, or any domain that merely mentions “Sri Lanka” or “ETA” in the name.

• Official: eta.gov.lk ✓
• Also official: immigration.gov.lk ✓
• Not the government: eta.org.lk, srilankavisa.org.lk, e-visa.org.lk, srilankavisa.lk, go-sri-lanka.com, srilanka-visaonline.com, srilankaetavisa.com, srilanka-etaonline.com, and anything else outside .gov.lk

Type the address yourself. Don’t trust the first search result, sponsored or otherwise. Several of the named fake sites have ranked above eta.gov.lk in Google results for exactly the searches you’d run to find the real thing. Ten seconds spent checking the address bar is the entire defense here.

If You’ve Already Paid a Third-Party Site

Check your confirmation document. A legitimate Sri Lanka ETA approval references the Department of Immigration and Emigration, carries an official government reference number, and lists your travel details exactly as submitted. If your document is just a receipt from a private company with no government reference number, apply again directly at eta.gov.lk before you travel. Your airline will check against Sri Lanka’s actual immigration database, not against whatever a third-party invoice says.

If you paid and got nothing usable back, dispute the charge through your card issuer. These operations generally don’t run functioning customer service, and a chargeback is the realistic path to getting your money back. And if you’re an eligible nationality who paid a scam site for something that should have been free since May 25, that’s doubly worth disputing — you paid up to $139 for a form that, for your passport, currently costs nothing.

This is the same category of mistake covered in our broader rundown of travel scams worth planning around: a small, avoidable paperwork error turning into a real financial hit before the trip even starts. Kenya’s eTA scam and India’s eVisa scam run the identical structure, which is worth knowing if Sri Lanka is one leg of a bigger Asia itinerary.

The Bottom Line

Sri Lanka’s ETA is $50 for most travelers, $20 for other SAARC nationals, and free as of May 25, 2026 for 40 eligible countries including the US, UK, Canada, and Australia. The only place to get it is eta.gov.lk. At least eight fake portals (eta.org.lk, srilankavisa.org.lk, e-visa.org.lk, srilankavisa.lk, go-sri-lanka.com, srilanka-visaonline.com, srilankaetavisa.com, and srilanka-etaonline.com) have been named in formal warnings from Sri Lanka’s own government and from embassies in Pakistan, Indonesia, and India, and some charge up to $139 for the same form.

The free-ETA rollout is genuinely good news for a lot of travelers. It’s also exactly the kind of change that scam sites count on you not having fully absorbed yet. Check your eligibility, go to eta.gov.lk directly, and don’t let a search ad talk you into paying for something that might not cost you a cent.

If Sri Lanka’s beaches, hill country trains, or Sigiriya and the Cultural Triangle are anywhere on your 2026 list, handle this now. It’s a five-minute form, and for a lot of nationalities this year, a free one.

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Official Sri Lanka ETA portal: eta.gov.lk. Embassy warnings: High Commission of Sri Lanka in Pakistan · High Commission of India in Colombo. Free-ETA policy reporting: VisasNews. Information current as of August 2026. Verify current fees and eligibility before travel.