Applying for an Indian e-visa, or indeed any country's electronic travel authorization, is designed to be a simple and efficient online procedure. However, for numerous international travelers in the early months of 2026, this experience has proven to be frustratingly complex and time-consuming. What should ideally take just a few minutes has transformed into an exercise requiring hours, and in some cases, multiple days of persistent effort.
Widespread Technical Failures Disrupt Visa Applications
In the specific context of India's e-visa system, several applicants attempting to complete their submissions during January have reported encountering consistent technical malfunctions on the official government portal. Users frequently find themselves trapped midway through the application process, unable to progress to subsequent sections. Web pages load inconsistently, only to crash completely when individuals click the 'Next' button, compelling them to refresh browsers repeatedly and re-enter all details from the beginning.
For families or groups applying together, this frustration intensifies exponentially. Applications often stall precisely at the moment when critical personal information or passport details are being submitted, forcing entire groups to restart the tedious process multiple times.
Social Media Outcry Highlights Systemic Problems
The severity of these issues gained significant attention after one particularly exasperated traveler, using the pseudonym 'aggravating-Stage 261,' voiced concerns on the popular platform Reddit. The post inquired whether this problematic experience was universal or uniquely unfortunate, stating: "Is it just me? Or the Indian visa online keeps crashing every time? I think I have pressed refresh more than 300 times... The times I get through will be around less than 10 times and I'm now on my family's details but when I click next, it crashes again. I am so tired already!!!!! Any tips."
This query triggered an overwhelming flood of responses that clearly demonstrated this was far from an isolated incident. Numerous individuals shared strikingly similar stories of spending days battling the unresponsive website across various devices and multiple internet browsers.
Community Shares Unconventional Workarounds
One commenter detailed their ordeal: "Jan 2026: Absolute terrible experience applying for e-visa. It almost took us three days to lodge two applications. Tried different timings, different browsers, IE mode in Internet Explorer, several different devices." While complaints about the portal's instability were remarkably consistent, so too were the unconventional solutions proposed by the user community.
One widely endorsed workaround involved completely abandoning mainstream web browsers. A user noted: "The only thing that worked for us was the DuckDuckGo browser (freshly installed). First application went smoothly with no crashing," though they added that their second application still required an entire night to complete successfully.
Other recommendations included using Microsoft Edge with Internet Explorer mode enabled—a seemingly archaic solution in 2026 that nevertheless helped some applicants. Additional technical hurdles emerged regarding file size restrictions for uploaded documents, with some travelers resorting to online compression services simply to proceed past the document upload stage.
Quick Approvals Follow Chaotic Submission Process
Despite the chaotic and prolonged submission process, many users reported that once their applications were finally accepted by the system, approval notifications arrived relatively swiftly. One comment observed: "But the processing is pretty quick. Received approval in a day," indicating that the primary bottleneck exists at the application submission phase rather than in the actual visa processing by authorities.
Disclaimer: This report is based on user experiences shared on social media platforms. The technical issues described have not been independently verified through official channels.
