The numbers
Published by the Thai Immigration Bureau on the official TDAC portal.
There is no fee of any kind. Thai Immigration has said so repeatedly and in public.
You cannot submit earlier than three days before you arrive.
Longer if you do not have your flight number and first night's address to hand.
Every foreign national entering Thailand by air, land or sea.
It is free, and that is the whole problem
The TDAC is unusual on this site: the scam is not overcharging, it is charging at all.
The Thai government charges nothing to submit the TDAC.
What operators have been observed charging for the same free form.
Thai Immigration warned travellers on the day the system launched. Its notice described sites that look official but charge money for the arrival card and collect sensitive personal data. By June 2025 the authorities had started a public campaign about it, citing confusion and manipulation of search results by the operators of those sites.
That is an unusually direct statement for an immigration authority to make, and it is worth taking at face value. If a page asks for your card details for a TDAC, it is not the Thai government.
The one official address
There is a single portal and its address is short.
tdac.immigration.go.thOfficial, ThailandThe suffix that matters is .go.th, which is reserved for Thai government bodies and cannot be bought. Anything else, however official the wording, is a business.
How to submit it
Have your flight number and your first night's address ready before you start.
- Wait until you are within 72 hours of arrival. Earlier submissions are not accepted.
- Open the official portal and start a new arrival card.
- Enter your passport details exactly as printed, including the middle name if your passport shows one.
- Enter your flight number and the address of your first night's accommodation.
- Answer the health and travel history questions.
- Save or screenshot the confirmation QR code. Immigration scans it on arrival.
What goes wrong
Four failures. The first costs money, the rest cost time at the desk.
- Paying for it. Nobody should ever pay for a TDAC. If you already have, that money went to a private operator, not to Thailand, and the form they filed is the same free one.
- Trying to submit too early. The window opens 72 hours before arrival. People often try to do it when booking, find it rejected, and then forget.
- One submission for the family. Each traveller needs their own arrival card, including children.
- A name that does not match the passport. The card is matched against the passport at the border. Nicknames, missing middle names and swapped given and family names all cause problems on arrival.
What changed
This requirement is recent, which is why so much travel advice omits it.
The TDAC becomes mandatory for all foreign nationals and replaces the paper TM6 arrival card. Thai Immigration warns about fee charging copy sites the same day.
Thai authorities begin a public campaign, citing ongoing confusion and manipulation of search results by the copy sites.
Still free, still mandatory, still widely sold by third parties.