South Korea opens quarantine-free travel for fully vaccinated travellers

South Korea has reopened its borders for leisure travel, allowing fully vaccinated travellers to enter the country quarantine-free from Apr 1 onwards.

Instead of applying for quarantine exemptions before arrival, those fully vaccinated will only need to provide evidence of being fully vaccinated. 

To be considered fully vaccinated, one would need to have received two doses of COVID-19 vaccines approved by the World Health Organisation. They would need to have been fully vaccinated for between 14 and 180 days, or have received a booster shot. 

To make the entry process quicker, overseas travellers can register their personal information, health declaration and vaccination records on South Korea’s Q-Code website before departure.

This will produce a personalised QR code which can be scanned at immigration in place of submitting physical documents. Travellers who were fully vaccinated overseas can only enter Korea quarantine-free if they pre-register their information on Q-Code. 

This form of expedited entry is only available at Incheon International Airport, but there are plans to expand it to other airports in future. 

All travellers are still required to show proof of a negative PCR test result no more than 48 hours before departure. Children under six are exempt from this requirement. 

Unvaccinated travellers and those visiting from Vietnam, Ukraine and Myanmar are still required to serve a seven-day quarantine upon arrival in South Korea. 

South Korea’s updated travel requirements can be found on its travel site.