How to move to Cambodia

Cambodia has the easiest long-stay visa in the region. You fly in on a US$35 ordinary (E) visa, extend it inside the country, and if you’re 55 or over the ER retirement extension asks for no income test or deposit.

The parts people get wrong are smaller: arriving on the wrong visa, a landlord who never registers your address, and leaving health insurance until too late. This is the order I’d do things in for a stay of a year or more. Cambodia is one of the countries I move between, and Kampot is likely my next base, so I’m checking these steps for myself. If you’re retiring, my Cambodia retirement guide goes deeper on the ER extension.

Step 1: Arrive on the ordinary (E) visa

Australians, Britons, Americans, Canadians and most Europeans need a visa for Cambodia. Citizens of other ASEAN countries can mostly enter visa-free, so check your own case. Your passport needs at least six months left from the day you arrive.

You can get either visa online through the official e-visa site, or on arrival at the international airports. The e-visa fees since 1 January 2025:

If you’re moving, get the E visa. The T visa can only be extended once, then you have to leave. Every long-stay option is built on the E visa.

Step 2: Fill in the e-Arrival card

Everyone flying into Phnom Penh, Siem Reap or Sihanoukville fills in the Cambodia e-Arrival card online. It’s free, you do it within the seven days before you land, and it covers immigration, customs and health in one form. Keep the confirmation on your phone for the airport.

Step 3: Choose your E visa extension

Before your first 30 days run out, you extend the E visa as one of four types. Six- and 12-month extensions allow multiple entries; one- and three-month ones don’t.

What that means in practice:

• ER is the retiree’s option. It comes in one, three, six or 12 months. There’s no set minimum income or deposit, but you need to be 55 or over and able to support yourself, and an officer can ask for bank statements. If you’re younger and not working, there’s no easy long-stay path, so get advice before you commit.
• EB is for working, and needs a work permit. You can get a first EB extension without one, but renewals need a valid work permit or proof of business activity. Working on any other extension isn’t allowed.
• EG is a stopgap. It’s single entry and generally can’t be renewed. Treat it as time to find a job, not a way to stay.

Most people apply through a visa agent, who handles the forms and the trip to immigration. Agent prices change often, and my retirement guide has the typical cost of a 12-month ER extension.

Don’t overstay. The fine is charged per day with no upper limit, and the UK and Canada both warn that overstaying can lead to detention and deportation.

Step 4: Get your address registered (FPCS)

The Foreigners Present in Cambodia System, usually called FPCS, is the national register of where foreigners live. Skip it and your next visa extension can be refused. The UK Foreign Office says so plainly in its entry advice.

• Hotels, guesthouses and rentals: the manager or landlord registers you. Ask them to confirm it, because small landlords often don’t.
• If you own your home or stay with family: you register yourself through the FPCS app, which needs a Cambodian phone number.
• When you move: get the record updated to the new address.

Step 5: Read the safety advice, especially for the Thai border

Smartraveller’s overall level for Cambodia is “exercise a high degree of caution”. It says do not travel within 50km of the Thai border in seven provinces: Banteay Meanchey, Oddar Meanchey, Preah Vihear, Battambang, Pailin, Pursat and Koh Kong. The reasons are armed conflict, military strikes, landmines and unexploded ordnance.

Canada’s advice notes a ceasefire agreed on 27 December 2025, but Smartraveller still describes the clashes as ongoing, and the land crossings between Cambodia and Thailand are closed. The UK and Canada say much the same as Australia. If you’re from elsewhere, read your own government’s page, because it affects your travel insurance.

For now that rules out living in Battambang or near that border, and it means no road trips to Thailand. Flights to Bangkok still run, which matters if you’d planned on Bangkok hospitals.

Step 6: Open a bank account

You can live on cash and a foreign card for a while, but a local account makes rent and bills much easier. ABA and ACLEDA are the two names you’ll hear most.

ABA publishes what it wants from a foreigner opening a savings account at a branch:

• your original, valid passport and a valid Cambodian visa (any type)
• proof you’re staying at least six months: a visa of six months or more (or visas adding up to 182 days), a lease of six months or more, proof of employment, or a business licence

There’s no minimum balance. ACLEDA and other banks set their own lists, so ask at the branch first. The easy order is: get your six- or 12-month extension and your lease, then open the account.

For moving money from home, see money transfers. For what to keep open in Australia, see expat banking.

Step 7: Get used to two currencies

The riel is the official currency, but US dollars are legal tender and used everywhere. Rent, restaurants and most bigger purchases are priced in dollars, and change under a dollar usually comes back in riel. The National Bank of Cambodia’s official rate on 13 October 2026 was 4,070 riel to the US dollar.

ATMs are common in Phnom Penh, Siem Reap and Sihanoukville, and scarcer in small towns. Card skimming happens, so use ATMs inside banks where you can.

Step 8: Rent before you buy anything

Most expats find places through agents, Facebook groups or by walking the neighbourhood they like.

Leases are usually six or 12 months, with a deposit held by the landlord and rent paid monthly in US dollars. Get the lease in writing, in English, with the deposit and the conditions for getting it back. Take dated photos on the day you move in.

Before you sign, ask the landlord to register you in FPCS and to give you a copy of the lease. You may need both for your visa and your bank. My apartment-hunting guide has a checklist that works here too.

Step 9: Know the property rules before you buy

The rules for foreigners are strict:

• No land. Foreigners and foreign companies can’t own land in Cambodia.
• Units from the first floor up. Under the 2010 law on foreign ownership, you can own a strata-titled unit, such as a condo, but not on the ground floor or underground.
• A 70% cap. Foreigners can own at most 70% of the private unit area in a building.
• Not near a land border. Units in buildings within 30km of a land border are excluded, with limited exceptions.

So a house with a garden is off the table as a foreign owner. Schemes that use a Cambodian nominee to hold land for you carry serious risk. Take independent advice from a Cambodian lawyer before signing anything, and check the building actually has strata titles issued, not just promised.

Step 10: Sort health insurance before you fly

Healthcare is Cambodia’s weak spot. Smartraveller says outside Phnom Penh there are almost no facilities that can handle a medical emergency, and hospitals usually want cash up front. Serious cases often go to Bangkok or Singapore.

Buy international cover that includes Cambodia and medical evacuation before you leave home. Some insurers stop taking new customers at 70 or earlier, so don’t leave it late. My healthcare and insurance guide covers what to look for, and healthcare in Cambodia names the hospitals and explains how evacuation works.

A six-month timeline

For budgets, cost of living in Cambodia covers Phnom Penh, Siem Reap, Kampot and Sihanoukville. Living in Kampot looks at the town that’s likely my next base, and retiring in South East Asia compares Cambodia with its neighbours.