Arriving at Baghdad Airport - 2023 updates
The last few times we have landed in Baghdad - at inhospitable hours of the early morning - we’ve gone through a different area for arrivals, so we thought it was time for an update.
Now all the Covid checks have finished (Iraq has lifted its vaccination requirement for travellers), you enter straight into a fairly large foyer area, facing a row of passport booths, one of which is for diplomatic personnel with the rest for ‘Iraqis’ and ‘others’. Only a few of these may be staffed, depending on the hour and flight schedules.
Visa on arrival (VOA)
On the right of these booths (before approaching passport control) is a small wooden desk, which is usually unmanned, and several rows of chairs nearby. This desk will probably have a small pile of blank VOA application forms and, even if there are no staff present, you can fill one of these out.
This is a single-page form, with questions in English and Arabic, asking for basic personal information, passport details, origin, and where you are staying in Iraq. There are no pens, so we recommend carrying your own.
By the time you have completed the form, at least one official should have appeared and, if not, one soon should. You hand the completed form, along with your passport, to the official who will take it away, often with a whole bundle of others.
Before passports and application forms are taken away, you are likely to be asked to produce a hotel booking. This regulation has long since officially been dropped but officials do sometimes still try to enforce it, demanding $50 per person for not having a booking which, unfortunately, appears to be a kind of scam. Therefore, we strongly recommend that you have a paper print-out of a hotel booking to show them. Even a text message (in Arabic) confirming your booking or residence would be helpful although, in this case, officials may ask you to phone the hotel so they can verbally confirm, which is particularly annoying (and potentially expensive) if the airport wifi is not working.
If you don’t have a hotel booking, because airport officials generally only speak basic English, we suggest being friendly but apologetic, with lots of smiles, and you might get away without being ‘fined’.
Time frames for the return of the official with the passports are varied - generally between around 15 and 40 minutes. You can take a seat and pass the time reading or attempting to use the free and sporadically functional airport wifi to inform your nearest and dearest, or any Iraqi contacts, that you have landed safely in Baghdad. On our last trip, the wi-fi was not functional, so best not to rely on that.
When your passport is returned with the visa inside, it’s time to pay for it, which needs to be in cash (dollars). It's best to have the correct sum to hand, as change is not always available. The price should technically be $75 but the standard amount charged is $77, the extra $2 apparently “for the sticker”. At this point, you may also be under pressure to pay a $50 ‘fine’ if you have landed without evidence of a hotel booking.
No mater how many Iraqis, embassy staff or fellow travellers assure you that you don’t need a hotel booking for a VOA, based on our experience, there is still currently a high likelihood you will be asked for this when you land and, if you don’t have one, there will be an expectation for you to pay a $50 ‘fine’.
Passport control (and pre-arrival visa)
Once you have the VOA in your passport, or if you already have a visa issued by the Iraqi embassy in your country of origin, you can generally head to any manned passport control desk, apart from the diplomatic one (unless you are indeed a diplomat).
If you have a pre-arrival visa, however, you may still be directed back to the visa desk on the right, to have your visa checked and authorised. There is no cost for this, as you will have already paid (usually around £50) for your visa at the embassy.
At passport control, an official will check your passport and visa and take a photo of you with a small camera attached to the desk.
After passport control
After passport control but before the baggage carousels, there is a security scanner through which you put all your bags but not phones. You may get asked to show any photographic equipment you have in your bag.
You can then collect your luggage from (or beside) the carousel. After you have collected your luggage, you walk out into the main airport through customs. You are unlikely to be stopped here but, if you are, just smile and be pleasant, and open bags or answer questions, if requested.
Great, you’re in!
Note: If you want to be more fully prepared, check out our previous posts Arriving at Baghdad Airport I and II.
