Oman visa for UAE residents: eVisa rules, land borders and Musandam trips

Do UAE residents need a visa for Oman?

Your UAE residence permit does not decide this. Your passport does. The Omani Ministry of Foreign Affairs sorts visitors into three groups:

• GCC citizens (Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE) enter without a visa.
• Exempt nationalities stay up to 14 days without a visa. Oman publishes two lists. The first includes the UK, the US, Canada, Australia, Japan, Russia, Turkey and most of the EU.
• Everyone else applies for an eVisa through the Royal Oman Police (ROP) before travelling.

The second list is conditional. It includes India, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Mexico and Vietnam, among others. Those nationals also need to be resident in a GCC country or hold a valid visa for the United States, Canada, Australia, the UK, a Schengen state or Japan. Read the current wording on the Ministry’s entry visas page, because the lists change.

What the 14-day exemption requires

• A passport valid for at least six months.
• A return ticket.
• A confirmed hotel reservation.
• Health insurance.
• Enough money for the stay.

The stay cannot be extended or converted to a residence visa. Spouses and children benefit from the exemption even if they hold a different nationality from the main traveller.

How the Royal Oman Police eVisa works

Applications go through evisa.rop.gov.om. You log in first, then pick the service: tourist, work or residency. For a visit, the Ministry says the unsponsored Tourist Visit Visa will usually be the right one.

We could not confirm the fee, the processing time or the stay length for GCC residents from an official page, so we do not quote them here. Check them on the portal before you pay anyone. The ROP call centre answers on +968 22848200 from outside Oman and takes email at Info-OmaneVisa@rop.gov.om.

Which border do you use from Dubai?

For Musandam, two crossings matter:

Crossing	UAE side	Leads to	Notes
Dibba	East coast road	Dibba Al-Bay’ah, then the Musandam coast	About 146 km, 1 h 50 min from Downtown Dubai without traffic (OSRM). ROP began operations here on 26 February 2025.
Al Darah	Ras Al Khaimah	Tibat, then Khasab	The ICP lists it among the UAE’s border crossings.

Our guide to Dibba or Khasab compares the two days. The Hatta border crossing and the wider UAE to Oman border crossings guide cover the other posts. Which crossings expatriates may use is a point to confirm with ROP, not to guess from a tour operator.

Driving a UAE car into Oman

Oman’s insurance requirement for UAE-registered cars and the UAE’s exit fee are official figures we have not confirmed, so we leave them out. Ask the insurer and ICP. If you would rather not drive, a chauffeur-driven trip on our Oman cross-border page or the Dubai to Muscat route removes the vehicle paperwork from your list. Send your route on WhatsApp and we say what we can run.

On a UAE tourist visa? Check before you cross

The GDRFA describes the single-entry tourist visa as an entry visa for a single visit. Leaving for Oman on one may therefore end your right to return. Confirm the position with GDRFA or ICP, or apply for a multiple-entry visa. Our UAE visas explained hub and the visa pages point to the official routes. Residents should confirm how their own permit applies when they ask.

Coming back into the UAE

Carry the passport you left with and your Emirates ID if you hold one. Leave slack in the return timing, because border queues vary and the dhow or your driver may be waiting. For a day on the water, see our Musandam tour. For the mountain road, see our Hatta tour. GCC residents who also wonder about UAE rules can read the eVisa for GCC residents guide, and travellers heading to Riyadh can read the Saudi visa guide. If your nationality is not on Oman’s lists, see the visa-free countries guide for what else your passport opens.