Visa Waiver Program (VWP)

Important Notice:

The United States Embassy in Singapore wishes to remind travelers of document requirements for travel to the United States under the Visa Waiver Program.

International travelers, who are nationals of Visa Waiver Program (VWP) countries -- including Singapore, seeking to travel to the United States without a visa, should review this important information on passport requirements for travelers under the Visa Waiver Program (VWP).  All VWP travelers, regardless of age or type of passport used, must present individual machine-readable passports.  In addition, depending on when VWP travelers’ passports were issued, other passport requirements apply:

• Machine-readable passports issued or renewed/extended on or after 10/26/06 – requires integrated chip with information from the data page.
• Machine-readable passports issued or renewed/extended between 10/26/05 and 10/25/06 – requires digital photograph printed on the data page or integrated chip with information from the data page.
• Machine-readable passports issued or renewed/extended before 10/26/05 – no further requirements.
• Temporary, emergency, official and diplomatic passports are exempted from biometric digital photo and chip requirements, but must be machine-readable. Note that German temporary or emergency passports are not included in this biometric e-passport exemption.  Therefore, holders of German temporary or emergency passports must either obtain a valid, machine-readable regular German passport for VWP travel or apply for a U.S. visa to travel to or through the United States.

If a traveler cannot meet all of the requirements, he/she must obtain a visa for entry to the United States, and cannot travel without a visa on VWP.  Travelers who require a visa may obtain information and forms by referring to the U.S. Embassy website at http://singapore.usembassy.gov.  More information on the Visa Waiver Program can be obtained at http://travel.state.gov/visa/temp/without/without_1990.html