North Korea

Do South Africans need a visa for North Korea?

A visa is required. North Korea has been largely closed to tourists since 2020, with only brief, limited reopenings since. When tourism is possible at all, it runs only through state-approved tour operators, which arrange the visa as part of the tour. You can’t travel independently.

What the travel advisory says

The UK Foreign Office advises against all but essential travel to North Korea, noting that tension on the Korean Peninsula remains high. Foreign visitors have faced long detentions for acts that would be minor elsewhere.

This is the advice as we checked it on 19 September 2026. It can change overnight, so read the current FCDO advice before making any decision. We use the UK Foreign Office as our benchmark because its advice is detailed, broken down by region and regularly updated. The US State Department and Australia’s Smartraveller are worth checking too.

If you have to travel

If tours reopen and you’re considering one, follow the operator’s rules to the letter. Outside help is extremely limited: few countries have diplomatic missions in Pyongyang.

Check that your travel insurance explicitly covers North Korea. Most standard policies exclude destinations under these warnings, and travelling against official advice can void your cover. Tell someone at home your plans, and find the nearest South African mission before you go — DIRCO lists them.

Why this page exists

South Africans search for the entry rules for North Korea, and they deserve an honest answer, so we cover them here. This isn’t a travel guide, though, and North Korea isn’t in our where-to-go filter because the official advice is against travel. If that changes, we’ll build it out into a full guide.