Malaysia entry requirements and the arrival card

Most common visitor passports enter Malaysia without a visa, and the length depends on your nationality rather than on your plan. Dutch, British, Irish, German, American, Australian and many other passports currently receive up to ninety days as visitors at no charge, while several nationalities get thirty or fewer and some need a visa arranged in advance. Check your own nationality against the immigration department's own list before you book, because these tables change without much notice and airlines enforce them at check-in.

The arrival card is the part people miss. The Malaysia Digital Arrival Card is free and submitted online in the three days before you arrive, not weeks ahead and not on landing. Fill it in with the passport details exactly as printed, and keep the confirmation on your phone. Beware of lookalike sites that charge a fee for the same form; the official one costs nothing. Your passport also needs at least six months of validity from the date you arrive, and immigration can ask for onward travel and proof you can support yourself.

Sabah and Sarawak run their own immigration control, and this surprises people mid-trip. Flying from Kuala Lumpur to Kota Kinabalu or Kuching is a domestic flight, but you clear immigration on arrival and receive a new stamp with its own permitted stay, which can be shorter than the one you were given on the peninsula. Keep your passport accessible on those legs, and check the stamp before you leave the hall rather than at the airport on the way out.

On health, no vaccination certificate is required for ordinary arrivals from Europe, but dengue is a year-round mosquito risk across the country and is the practical thing to plan for: repellent, covered evenings and accommodation with screens or air conditioning. Tap water is treated but not reliably drinkable from the tap everywhere, so use sealed, boiled or filtered water unless your accommodation tells you otherwise.