Indonesia, student visa
Indonesia retired the C316 code. The student visa you need now is an E30B.
One approval from immigration, one from the higher education ministry, a bank statement showing $2,000, and a university willing to sponsor you.
Nearly every guide online still calls this visa C316. Indonesia replaced that index in June 2025. A degree student applies under E30B now. Here is what the new file asks for, who has to file it, and why no American university can lend you a dollar toward it.
- Capital
- Jakarta
- Language
- Bahasa Indonesia
- Currency
- Indonesian Rupiah (IDR)
- Population
- 277M
Which one is yours
There are five student visas now, not one
The 2025 reclassification cut Indonesia's visa list from 133 indexes to 110. It also broke the old student category into pieces. Your sponsor files one of these, but the wrong one wastes a month.
E30B, for a degree
Diploma, bachelor's, master's and doctorate all sit under this single index now. The stay permit runs one, two or four years.
E30F, for an exchange term
Brand new in the same decree, for students swapped in under a university partnership.
C9, for a short course
A visit visa rather than a stay permit. It gives you 60 days on arrival plus two 60-day extensions, so 180 days at most, single entry. Fly to Singapore for a weekend and it dies. C9B is the Bahasa Indonesia version.
E30, for non-formal study
Live since July 15, 2025, for language schools and professional courses. One or two years.
E30A, for school-age children
Elementary through senior high. If you're moving a family, that's your child's index, not yours.
Student Visa (C316)
For students enrolled in Indonesian educational institutions. Valid for the duration of the academic program.
- Government cost
- $50
- Processing time
- ~7 days
- Timeline
- Duration of academic program
- Difficulty
- Moderate
Key requirements
- Acceptance letter from Indonesian educational institution
- Letter of recommendation from the institution
About that data card
Three lines on it have aged badly. The name is the retired index, since the Directorate General of Immigration swapped C316 for E30B on June 2, 2025. The $50 is not close to the real bill: the state fee for a one-year education permit is Rp 6,000,000, and two and four year permits run Rp 8,500,000 and Rp 12,000,000. That is roughly $340, $480 and $675 at 17,800 rupiah to the dollar in September 2026. The requirements list also stops two items early. The file needs three months of bank statements showing at least $2,000, and a study permit from a ministry immigration does not control. One more thing to know: the difficulty word runs on a ten-point scale that our data only ever fills to five, so no route in here can read harder than moderate.
Who signs off
Two approvals, and they only work in this order
The study permit comes first
A foreigner at an Indonesian university needs an izin belajar, the study permit. Since October 2024, it belongs to Kemdiktisaintek, the higher education ministry, which is not the ministry that runs the schools, and not the one handing out the scholarships. Your university files it at izinbelajar.kemdiktisaintek.go.id; the published turnaround is seven working days. You sign three undertakings inside that file: you won't work while you study or take part in political activity. You will obey Indonesian law. The ministry also describes a clearing house forum that reviews and monitors foreign students. It names immigration foreign ministry, the state secretariat, the state intelligence agency and the national police as the bodies around that table.
Immigration comes second
Your sponsor, normally the university, holds the account on evisa.imigrasi.go.id and files the E30B for you. You never login yourself. Once issued, the visa is good for 90 days. Miss that window and your sponsor starts again.
Fees, tuition, and one zero
$2,000
The entire financial test
three months of statements, yours or your sponsor's
Rp 6,000,000
State fee, one-year permit
roughly $340 at September 2026 rates
Rp 23 to 65 million
UGM international tuition, one semester
computer science at the bottom, medicine at the top
Zero
Indonesian schools on the U.S. federal loan list
no new loans, and no deferment either
A year in rupiah
A UGM degree runs $2,600 to $7,300 a year
Indonesian public universities publish their international rates, and the numbers are gentle by American standards. UGM in Yogyakarta lists Rp 23,000,000 a semester for computer science, Rp 35,000,000 for international relations and Rp 65,000,000 for medicine. Call it $2,600, $3,900 and $7,300 a year. One quirk is worth catching. UGM bills the English-taught public policy degree at Rp 35,000,000 a semester and the Indonesian-taught version of the same degree at Rp 27,500,000. The language you study in is a price, not just a preference. Living costs surprise people in the other direction. Our country data puts a single adult at roughly $750 a month, and the student cities sit under that: Yogyakarta, Malang, Bandung, Surabaya. Jakarta and Bali do not. Budget the whole year upfront because this permit hands you no job to fall back on.
The work rule contradicts itself right now
One half of the government has moved and the other has not. The 2025 decree dropped the old ban on students taking payment from Indonesian people and companies, and the law firms tracking the change flagged it when it landed. The study permit you sign at the education ministry still has you promising not to work. Real employment still runs through an employer-sponsored work permit, which is a separate application your university has nothing to do with. Plan as though the answer is no.
Scholarships, not debt
Washington will not lend for this. It will pay for it.
The loan list
The Department of Education publishes the foreign schools that participate in the federal student loan programs. Indonesia has no schools on it. The neighborhood is almost as empty: one school in the Philippines, two in Thailand. All three are marked deferment only, meaning they can pause payments on debt you already carry but can't put new money in your hand. No Indonesian campus holds even that status, so loans you're already repaying keep their schedule while you study.
What replaces it
Bahasa Indonesia sits on the U.S. government's critical-language list, which changes the arithmetic completely. The Critical Language Scholarship sends Americans to Universitas Negeri Malang for a fully funded summer, beginners welcome. Boren Awards pay up to $25,000 for undergraduates and $30,000 for graduate students, and their Indonesian Flagship Language Initiative runs at that same university, in exchange for a year of federal service afterward. Fulbright works through AMINEF in Jakarta. Freeman-Asia and Gilman help with shorter terms. Indonesia's own Darmasiswa program covers a non-degree year of language and arts, pays around Rp 4,700,000 a month and opens each May.
What people get wrong about this one
Can I enroll on a visa on arrival and sort the paperwork later?
No. The visa on arrival is a visit status and study is not on its list of permitted activities. Even a six-week course needs the institution to file a C9 for you. Being caught studying on a visit status puts both your stay and your next entry at risk.
Can I move to a work permit after I graduate?
Not smoothly. There is no post-study visa, and the standard route is an E23 sponsored by an Indonesian company, which files a manpower plan and justifies hiring a foreigner over a local. Guidance puts the usual bar at five years of experience, which a new graduate does not have.
Can my spouse and kids come with me?
Yes, through the family indexes rather than yours. Dependents apply in the E31 series against your permit, and a child enrolled in an Indonesian school gets an E30A of their own. Nobody on a family permit gets a work right from it.
How far ahead should I start?
Two to three months. Immigration itself is quick once the fee is paid, roughly a week, which is what our data card measures. The study permit that has to exist before that application is where the calendar actually goes, and your university controls the pace.
Is the C316 student visa still valid?
The code is gone. Indonesia's June 2, 2025 reclassification folded it into the E30 family, and a university student now applies for E30B. Permits issued under the old code stay good until they expire, but any renewal is filed under the new index.
Are there degrees taught in English?
Plenty. UGM, Universitas Indonesia and ITB all run international undergraduate tracks in English, mostly in business, engineering, law and the social sciences. The catch is that the English section often costs more than the identical Indonesian one, so check both columns of the fee table.
Do the student years count toward permanent residency?
Assume not. The published routes to a KITAP run through work, investment, marriage to an Indonesian citizen or retirement, and no government page we found counts study time toward it. Indonesia also does not recognize dual nationality, so naturalizing means giving up your US passport.
What does overstaying cost?
One million rupiah for every day, per the State Department's own Indonesia page, and long overstays bring detention, deportation and a re-entry ban. Your sponsor files extensions, so put the expiry date in your own calendar and chase the university sixty days out.
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