Newsnomics AJAY ANGELINA reporter |

Saudi Arabia launched the unified visa platform called ‘KSA Visa’ to facilitate visa application procedures announced by Abdulhadi Almansouri, an Assistant Minister for Executive Affairs at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Tuesday while addressing the Digital Government Forum (DGF) in Riyadh.

Saudi’s Assistant Minister of Foreign Affairs for Executive Affairs Abdulhadi bin Ahmed Al-Mansouri, launched the unified national visa platform - KSA Visa - under the supervision of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Prince Faisal bin Farhan bin Abdullah. 

KSA, a unified visa platform is part of Saudi’s government’s endeavor to attract more tourists over the coming years. This platform is linked with more than 30 agencies, ministries, and the private sector that will facilitate the procedures for obtaining various types of visas, including the Hajj visa, visit visa for the purpose of Umrah, tourist visa, businesses as well as work visas.

GOV.SA, Saudi Arabia's national portal for government services and information will contribute to empower more than 50 government agencies and private sectors through government visas, also will automate the most important visa issuance procedures to improve the visitor experience.

GOV.SA is an advance informative platform that facilitate the visitors to check the visa availability in a quick manner. This unified reference provides the good understanding of requirements for all types of visas and how to apply for them. The platform also includes an updated personal file for the visitor that facilitates visas and reapplication for them later.

The unified visa platform includes the integration of artificial intelligence and other emerging technologies to help ensure the data accuracy and overall efficiency. Visit ksavisa.sa to use the new system.

Saudi Arabia’s move comes within the framework of its endeavor to increase the number of tourists, especially after launching many new tourist destinations, and raising its tourism target to 150 million visits annually by 2030.

Notably, Saudi Arabia has issued more than 18.6 million visas during the year 2023, and seeks to increase the volume of tourism spending to SR289 billion, as well as to achieve 88 million visitors, and more employment in the tourism sector by 2024.

Ahmed Alsuwaiyan, the Governor of the Digital Government Authority said earlier in light of the Kingdom’s Vision 2030, “Saudi Arabia is working to continue the digital transformation journey, by enabling all government agencies to raise the efficiency of digital services that contribute to improving the experience of beneficiaries and the quality of life, apart from increasing competitiveness.”