TDAC: Thailand Digital Arrival Card — a step-by-step guide

Since 1 May 2025, Thailand has introduced an online form — the Thailand Digital Arrival Card (TDAC), which must be completed on arrival (previously the form was the paper TM6). All foreigners, including Russian citizens, are required to fill it in before any entry into the country: by plane, by ferry, or by land from Laos or Malaysia.

I live and work in Pattaya, and I regularly help clients deal with this form. For most people it takes 5–10 minutes, but there are recurring situations the official manual leaves unclear: for example, what to put in the address field if you’re travelling without a booking, or whether a TDAC is needed when transiting through Bangkok. Below is a calm, no-fluff guide drawn from real experience.

What the TDAC is

This is an electronic questionnaire on the website of the Thai Immigration Bureau. In it you report your passport details, itinerary, accommodation address and a health declaration in advance. When you arrive, the officer at passport control sees your profile on screen and processes you faster. Essentially it’s the same paper TM6 that used to be filled in by hand on the plane, just moved online.

The TDAC is not a visa. It doesn’t depend on your visa status. Russian citizens currently have visa-free entry for up to 60 days, but the TDAC still has to be submitted — just as it does for those travelling on a Non-Immigrant, Education or any other visa.

Each entry means a new form. If during a trip you cross the border several times (for example, you go to Cambodia for a couple of days and come back), the TDAC has to be filled in again.

There is just one single website:

tdac.immigration.go.th.

The form is free.

If in search results you come across services that “process your TDAC for 990 rubles, urgently” — those are middlemen, and you don’t need to use them. Also note that there are sites that “pose” as official ones, but in reality they’re just intermediaries who, while you fill in the form, offer to arrange Fast Track (priority entry) at the airport.

In fact such sites do honestly state that they are intermediaries. It’s written in small print and easy to miss, and some of our clients don’t notice it. Then questions come up like: “Do we really have to arrange Fast Track for the TDAC — won’t they let me in without it?”. Here are examples of such sites and their warnings:

Who needs a TDAC and who doesn’t

Needed for:

all non-Thais arriving by plane — to Bangkok (Suvarnabhumi or Don Mueang), U-Tapao, Phuket, Chiang Mai, Samui, Krabi and anywhere else;
those entering by land from Laos, Cambodia or Malaysia;
those entering by sea — by ferry from Malaysia or on a cruise ship;
everyone, regardless of age: a separate form is filed for each child and infant (this can be done in a single group submission, see below).

Not needed for:

transit passengers who don’t leave the transit zone and don’t collect baggage in Thailand;
crew members.

In other words, if you have a layover in Bangkok on Moscow → Bangkok → Samui and in Bangkok you simply change planes without leaving the sterile zone, without collecting baggage or a new check-in — you don’t need a TDAC. But if the tickets are separate and in Bangkok you collect your luggage, go through passport control and check in again for a domestic flight — the TDAC is mandatory.

When to submit: the 72-hour rule

The submission window is within 3 days before the arrival date, including the date itself. In practice that’s up to 72 hours.

The system won’t accept the form earlier. If you try to open it a week ahead, you’ll see an error message.

It’s most convenient to fill it in 1–2 days before departure. By then it’s usually clear that the flight hasn’t been cancelled and the hotel hasn’t changed, and there’s a buffer of time to redo it if something goes wrong. I wouldn’t do it in a taxi on the way to the airport: when you’re stressed it’s easy to mistype the passport number.

Arriving in Bangkok on Saturday morning? Fill it in on Wednesday evening or Thursday.

But if you’re reading this article sitting on the plane ~~like and subscribe to our channel~~ — don’t worry. We ourselves often fill them in right before departure.

What you’ll need

your passport — you’ll need the number, the date of issue, the expiry date and your nationality;
your e-ticket — the flight number and the arrival date in Thailand, not the departure date from Russia;
the address of your first place of stay in Thailand — the hotel name and, ideally, the full address (street, Soi, district, province, postcode);
a working e-mail — the PDF with the QR code will be sent there;
a mobile phone number in international format;
a list of the countries you visited in the 14 days before arrival.

The address in Thailand is a critical field. It’s the one that most often causes problems — especially for those staying in Pattaya. If you’re heading to central Pattaya, the province will be Chonburi (with 80% probability if you’re a tourist), district Bang Lamung. For Na Jomtien Beach and further south, closer to U-Tapao — the district is Sattahip. For Phuket — the province is Phuket. For Samui — Surat Thani. Once you select the province and district, the system fills in the postcode automatically.

Step by step: how to fill in the form

Step 1. Go to the official website

Open tdac.immigration.go.th. On the home page, choose the interface language — Russian is supported, so the prompts will be readable. But all fields are filled in in the Latin alphabet, exactly as in your passport. Immigration works with the Latin alphabet, and trying to type Cyrillic will either be rejected by the form or come back to bite you at the border.

If it opens in English, switch to Russian.

Next, click the “Arrival Card” button (Submit Arrival Card / Arrival Card).

Step 2. Personal details

The most tedious and most important part. The majority of mistakes happen right here.

Family Name / Given Name — surname and first name strictly as in your passport, in Latin. No patronymic — the form doesn’t have one, and don’t try to slip it into Middle Name.
Passport Number — the passport number. The most common mistake is confusing the digit 0 (zero) and the letter O. Russian passports don’t use letters — only digits. Double-check.
Date of Birth, Date of Issue, Date of Expiry — date of birth, passport issue and expiry. Remember that the passport must be valid for at least another 6 months from the arrival date. Also, the date is entered starting with the YEAR, then the MONTH and then the DAY. Be especially careful not to mix up day and month. People often get confused here and either the form won’t go through or the data is incorrect.
Nationality / Citizenship — citizenship. For Russian citizens, choose RUS: RUSSIAN FEDERATION.
Country / Territory of Residence — your country of permanent residence. If you live in Russia — Russia. If you actually live in another country (Georgia, Serbia, Turkey, the UAE), state that one. This doesn’t contradict your Russian citizenship — citizenship and place of residence are different fields here.
City / State of Residence — your city of residence, in Latin.
Phone Number — in international format with a plus, for example +7 916 1234567.
Occupation — your occupation. For retirees — RETIRED, for schoolchildren and students — STUDENT, for homemakers — HOUSEWIFE. For everyone else, pick the closest option from the drop-down list. If your exact option isn’t there, take the nearest one by meaning — it’s not a problem.

If your screen has a Retrieve with Passport button, you can photograph the machine-readable zone of your passport (the two bottom lines on the photo page) or upload it as an image from your device. The fields will fill in by themselves. Convenient, but double-check anyway — the system sometimes gets the diacritics wrong.

Step 3. Trip information

Mode of Travel — Air, Land or Sea. For arriving by plane — Air.
Date of Arrival — the date of arrival in Thailand in local time. If you depart Moscow in the evening and the flight arrives in Bangkok the next morning, the arrival date is tomorrow’s date, not today’s.
Country / Territory where you Boarded — the country where your journey to Thailand started. If you fly Moscow → Istanbul → Bangkok and Istanbul is only a layover, put RUS. But if you actually live in Istanbul and start from there — TUR.
Flight No. / Vehicle No. — the flight number. Most clients from Russia arrive in Bangkok (Suvarnabhumi BKK or Don Mueang DMK); there it’s the number of your direct flight or the last leg of the connection. If you fly to U-Tapao via Bangkok, enter the number of the last flight to U-Tapao.
Travel Purpose — the purpose of the trip. For a holiday in Pattaya — Holiday. Tourism also works; in practice there’s no difference.

Step 4. Accommodation address in Thailand

State the first place where you’ll spend the night after arrival. If you stay in several hotels in a row, the first one goes in the form.

Type of Accommodation — Hotel for a hotel or guesthouse, Apartment for a rented apartment or villa, Friend’s House if you’re going to people you know.
Province — for Pattaya, Chonburi.
District / Sub-District — Bang Lamung for central Pattaya, Naklua and the northern part. Sattahip — for Jomtien Beach and the south. The prompt under the field will show district options after you choose the province.
Post Code — usually filled in automatically after the province and district. If it isn’t, for central Pattaya it’s 20150, for Jomtien — 20250, for Naklua — also 20150.
Address — the exact address: hotel name, street, Soi, house number. The field is long (up to 215 characters), so write it out fully. You can simply enter the condo name. You may put Dusit Grand Condo (where our office is located).

If your accommodation isn’t booked yet, make a reservation for at least one night with free cancellation on Booking or Agoda. That’s enough for the TDAC. After that you can change your plans — immigration won’t re-check — but having a meaningful address at the moment of entry is mandatory.

Step 5. Health declaration and countries visited

Countries where you stayed within two weeks before arrival — the countries you visited in the 14 days before arrival. If you were only at home in Russia, list it alone. If you flew to Dubai that week, add the UAE.

Step 6. If there are several of you, here you need to choose “Add more travellers” so you don’t have to repeat the same fields. If you’re alone, just agree and submit the form.

Step 7. Preview and submit

This is where you enter your email.

Click Submit. If your internet is unstable and you get an error like Http failure response or 429, refresh the page and submit again. It doesn’t mean the data was lost, and it doesn’t mean a duplicate form was submitted: only the last successful submission counts.

Step 8. Save the QR code

Done. Download the form:

After submission the system does two things:

shows the QR code right in the browser and offers to download a PDF;
duplicates the same QR code in an email to your inbox.

What to do at this point:

download the PDF and save it to your phone’s files offline (important — there’s no internet on the plane, and the Wi-Fi at the arrival airport doesn’t always work quickly);
take a screenshot of the QR code into your phone’s gallery as a backup;
check your email — if there’s no message, look in “Spam” and “Promotions”.

If the email never arrives, just fill in the form again — it’s not a problem. The system stores only the last submitted version, so resubmitting doesn’t cause issues.

You don’t need to print anything. At passport control you either show the QR code from your phone screen, or pass through the automatic gates — they read the passport themselves and link it to your form by the passport number.

If your details change

The website has an Update Arrival Card section — there you can edit a form you’ve already submitted.

You can update:

your accommodation address in Thailand;
the flight number and arrival date;
the health declaration;
the list of countries you visited in the two weeks before the trip.

You cannot update: your first name, surname, passport number, citizenship and date of birth. If you made a mistake in these fields, you need to submit a new form with the correct data. The last one submitted counts — the system always looks at the latest version.

The most common scenarios:

the airline changed the flight — update the number and date;
you changed hotels — either update the address, or don’t touch it at all if the first night is the same;
you mistyped the passport number — submit a new form, the old one is cancelled automatically.

Common situations (based on experience with arrivals in Pattaya)

Arriving in Bangkok and transferring to Pattaya

The most common scenario for our clients. The flight arrives at Suvarnabhumi (BKK) or Don Mueang (DMK), then a bus, taxi or transfer of about 2 hours to Pattaya. There’s almost no direct international flight from Russia to U-Tapao right now, so 9 out of 10 tourists in Pattaya arrive this way.

What’s important to know about the TDAC in this case:

In the Flight No. field, enter the number of your flight to Bangkok (the last leg if you fly with a connection). For example, EK384 for Emirates flights via Dubai, TG975 for Thai Airways from Moscow.
In the Country where you Boarded field, put the country where you started that day. If you flew Moscow → Dubai → Bangkok and Dubai is only a layover, put RUS.
In the address field, enter the hotel in Pattaya — the place where you spend your first night. Not the hotel in Bangkok if you don’t stay there, and not the airport.
The province for Pattaya is Chonburi, district Bang Lamung (for central Pattaya and Naklua) or Sattahip (for Jomtien Beach and the south).

If your plan is: arrive in Bangkok late in the evening, spend the night at a Bangkok hotel near the airport, leave for Pattaya in the morning — then the Bangkok hotel goes in the TDAC, because it’s your first place of overnight stay. Hotels near Suvarnabhumi are listed under the province Samut Prakan, those near Don Mueang — Bangkok.

Passport control at Suvarnabhumi runs 24/7, and at peak arrival times (early morning and evening) the queue can take 30–60 minutes. If your TDAC is already submitted, you go either to the automatic gates or to the desks marked Foreign Passports.

Arriving at U-Tapao (UTP)

U-Tapao is a small airport about 30 minutes from Pattaya. There are no regular direct flights from Russia to U-Tapao at the moment, but charters from the CIS sometimes operate, and there are short domestic flights from Bangkok (Bangkok Airways PG, Thai Vietjet VZ). Passport control for international flights exists there too, and the TDAC is mandatory.

An important point: U-Tapao has no self-service kiosks for submitting the TDAC on site. They’re only at Suvarnabhumi, Don Mueang, Phuket, Chiang Mai and Hat Yai. So if you fly via U-Tapao, fill in the form in advance — on site they may simply send you off to find Wi-Fi and fill it in from your phone.

Two or more — separately or as a group

A group submission (Group) is more convenient. One person enters everyone’s details, and each gets their own QR code. The limit is 10 people per application. That’s enough for a family with children, plus grandma and the mother-in-law.

Children

Children are filled in as separate forms within the same group submission. The key condition is that the child must have their own valid passport. The old practice of recording a child in a parent’s passport doesn’t work for the TDAC, because Thai immigration only deals with individual documents.

In the Occupation field for a schoolchild or student — STUDENT; for a very small child, take the nearest suitable option (CHILD/UNEMPLOYED).

Several hotels along the route

The TDAC lists only the first place of stay. If the first week is in Pattaya, then a week on Samui, then two days in Bangkok — only Pattaya goes in the form. No separate TDACs are needed for domestic flights and transfers.

Travelling without a booking

If for some reason you don’t have a single booking at the time of filling in, there are two working options:

make a reservation for one or two nights with free cancellation on Booking or Agoda and enter it. There are hundreds of hotels in Pattaya with that option, from 800 ฿ a night.
if you’re going to people you know, enter their address, choosing Friend’s House. You’ll need their exact address: Soi, house, district.

You don’t need to enter an “agency address” or office in the TDAC — that’s not a place of residence.

You permanently live outside Russia

In the Country/Territory of Residence field, enter the country of actual residence. A Russian citizen living in Georgia puts Georgia. Citizenship (RUSSIAN) is stated separately and doesn’t change. This isn’t a contradiction — immigration understands perfectly the difference between a passport and a place of residence.

Transit through Bangkok

If you have a single ticket booking, you arrive in Bangkok and fly onward on the same ticket without collecting baggage or going through passport control — you don’t need a TDAC.

But if:

the tickets are with different airlines, booked separately;
you need to collect and re-check your baggage;
between flights you leave the sterile zone (for example, to transfer from Suvarnabhumi to Don Mueang) —

then technically you’re entering the country. The TDAC is mandatory.

If something goes wrong

The site won’t open or throws an error. Take a screenshot of the error. At the border you’ll tell the officer or go to Immigration Help — major airports have zones with Wi-Fi and staff assistance, and kiosks at Suvarnabhumi, Don Mueang, Phuket, Chiang Mai and Hat Yai. You can fill it in right there; it takes 5 minutes.

The email with the QR code didn’t arrive. Check “Spam” and “Promotions”. The system doesn’t send any separate reminders or notifications, so waiting for an SMS is pointless. If there’s nothing after an hour, fill it in again.

You changed your flight while already travelling. Open tdac.immigration.go.th on your phone, go to Update Arrival Card, and update the flight number and date. If the form won’t let you update, submit a new one. The window is the same 72 hours.

You arrived without a TDAC. It’s not a disaster. Most major airports have a kiosk or a Wi-Fi zone where you can fill it in on site. The queue at the desk may be longer than for those who submitted everything in advance, but you’ll be let into the country. The main thing is to have a smartphone or decent internet access.

Checklist before departing from Russia

The TDAC is completed within the 72-hour window before arrival.
First name, surname and passport number match the passport down to the character.
The country of departure and flight number match the e-ticket.
The accommodation address in Thailand is given for the first night, province Chonburi (if Pattaya).
The QR code is saved offline: in the phone gallery and in files (the PDF from the email).
The passport is valid for at least another 6 months from the arrival date.

With this set, passport control at Suvarnabhumi takes 5–15 minutes even at peak times.