Last verified: 2026-08-27 07:24 KST
Ninety days is a strange length of time. Long enough to stop visiting Korea and start living in it for a season, short enough that everything you do sits inside one set of rules — rules most long-stay visitors only half understand until something goes wrong at a counter.
This page is about what those ninety days permit, what they do not, and the two entry systems you have to clear before any of it starts.
The entry side: two portals, one question
Ask whether you need a visa for your nationality, purpose and length of stay. If yes, start with the Korea Visa Portal. Otherwise check K-ETA eligibility and exemptions. The current temporary exemption notice runs through 31 December 2026 (KST) for covered nationalities; it does not set every visitor’s permitted stay.
| Item | Official figure |
|---|---|
| Who applies | Nationals able to enter Korea without a visa |
| Fee | 10,000 KRW, roughly 7–8 USD |
| Processing | Generally within 72 hours |
| Where | Only www.k-eta.go.kr or the official K-ETA app |
Applying as a member or non-member makes no difference to fee, processing time or validity — registering only lets you check results without email verification and see your applications together.
There is also a temporary exemption arrangement in force for some nationalities, with an extension notice on the portal’s board dated 20 March 2026. Whether it covers your nationality and your travel dates changes, so read the notice board rather than any guide, including this one.
The scam the government warns about
This is printed on the official portal, not passed around by travellers. K-ETA states that applications are possible only through its own site or app, and warns about lookalike agency and phishing sites charging large fees for application or expedited services. Checked 2026-08-27.
The arithmetic gives you the test: the real fee is 10,000 KRW. Anything charging substantially more is an agent marking up a form you can complete yourself, or it is taking your passport details. Check that the domain ends in .go.kr, that the fee matches, and that you reached the page by typing the address rather than clicking a link. Our government portals guide covers which site does what.
What ninety days does not include
The single most consequential misunderstanding among long-stay visitors is treating visa-free entry as a general permission to be in Korea doing whatever they like.
Visa-free entry is for the purpose it was granted for. Working — including remote work arrangements that people assume are invisible, and paid short engagements — is a different question with a different answer depending on your status, and getting it wrong has consequences that outlast the trip.
If you are considering anything that looks like employment, ask the Immigration Contact Center on 1345 before you do it, not after. That number reaches the authority; a forum thread does not.
What ninety days does include, that shorter trips do not
The practical difference is that you stop optimising. A two-week visitor packs. A ninety-day visitor can afford a wasted Tuesday, which changes what is worth doing.
Base yourself and go out from there. The rail and bus network makes most of the country a day trip or a single overnight from Seoul, which means you do not need to relocate every few days. Where the subway alone reaches, and where your card stops subsidising you, is in our day trips guide.
Let the seasons decide the route. Korea’s seasons are sharply distinct rather than gradual, and the same destination is a different place in April and August. Plan around the season you are actually in rather than a generic itinerary.
Repeat things. The second visit to a neighbourhood is where it stops being a sight. This is the one advantage a long stay has that no amount of planning replicates.
The card question for a long stay
Most subsidised transit schemes are aimed at residents rather than visitors, and the eligibility rules are geographic. Seoul’s Climate Companion Pass benefit is for Seoul residents, and its short-term Climate Card passes — 1, 2, 3, 5 and 7 days — cover the Seoul area plus alighting at Incheon International Airport, with Gimpo, Goyang, Gwacheon, Guri, Seongnam, Hanam and Namyangju outside that coverage. Checked 2026-08-27.
For a ninety-day stay with day trips outside the city, that makes a plain T-money card the sane default: accepted nationwide, no registration, no residency test. Its costs, including the non-refundable card price and the 500 KRW refund fee, are in our T-money guide.
One exception to remember on your last day: airport buses do not accept the Climate Card or the Discover Seoul Pass, per the operator’s own notice. Cash or plain T-money. See our airport guide.
Money for ninety days
Without a residence card you are outside most of Korea’s identity-verified financial system, which is a constraint rather than a disaster. Cash works, foreign cards work in most places, and the transit card covers the gaps.
What you will not get is the app layer — the payment methods inside delivery and shopping apps that make Korean daily life frictionless for residents. Those sit behind Korean identity verification, which sits behind a Korean line registered in your name. Which of them fail at which wall is mapped in our essential apps guide.
If you decide to stay
Some people arrive for ninety days and start looking at how to make it longer. The honest summary: converting a visa-free stay into a residence status is not a formality, it is status-specific, and it is a conversation with immigration rather than a form you find online.
Not sure which day your 90 days run out? Our 90-day stay calculator gives you a safe exit date from your entry date.
What is worth knowing early is the shape of what follows — registration, a card, a bank account, and a chain of preconditions that decides the order. Our settling-in chain guide sets it out, and 1345 is the number for whether your particular route exists at all.
Numbers worth saving before you fly
- 119 — fire, ambulance, rescue. 112 — police. Both 24 hours, both dispatch.
- 1330 — Korea Travel Hotline, 24 hours year-round in Korean, English, Japanese and Chinese.
- 1345 — Immigration Contact Center, weekdays 09:00–22:00, but only Korean, English and Chinese after 18:00.
- 1588-5644 — BBB Korea volunteer interpretation, free, around the clock.
The language coverage behind each, and the phone configurations where emergency calls can be restricted, are in our help lines guide.
Verification note. On September 24, 2026 an AI-assisted check compared the 10,000 KRW K-ETA fee and K-ETA processing generally within 72 hours against the official K-ETA portal, and confirmed the official sources linked in this guide still resolve to the same pages. I publish this guide under my own name and am responsible for what it says. Rules and fees in Korea change often; if you spot something out of date, email hello@90dayskorea.com and it will be re-checked and corrected.
Sources
- K-ETA — official portal: fee, processing time, application channels, phishing warning
- K-ETA — notices, including the temporary exemption extension
- Korea Visa Portal — visa guidance by nationality
- Seoul Metropolitan Government — Climate Companion Pass Q&A: eligibility and short-term pass coverage (Korean)
- Airport Limousine Co. — payment notice (Korean)
- Korea Tourism Organization — official English visitor portal, home of the 1330 line
Last verified: 2026-08-27 07:24 KST. Visa-free periods, exemptions and permitted activities are nationality-specific and change. This is general information, not immigration advice; the portals linked above and 1345 are the authority.