What visa should I apply for to return to Thailand in September after leaving in March?

@Brett *********

DTV is fine, because it allows you to stay for 6 months, leave, and come back, but anything less than that wouldn’t allow you to stay there for more than 6 months. I have family in Thailand and had a long term visa in the past. I can get an METV, tourist visas and whatever, but I don’t feel comfortable spending there more than 5 months a year with less than a DTV visa, because it just gives them excuses to deny you.

Thailand is not Vietnam, or Laos, where you can just come and go with a tourist visa as much as you please

@Jordan ****

absolutely no business? Course you do. I travelled for over a year as a tourist. Didn’t work, paid money into the economies of all countries. Is that not the definition of tourism? You have no business working in a different country without a proper visa, but the Thai Government offers the METV (double and single entry) and DTV visas. Tell them they should change their visas. Whether said country allows you in at immigration is down to them, not you, so, if they offer a specific visa which fits the requirements of an individuals travel plans, you have zero right to tell them that they don’t have the correct visa.

@Brett *********

it does make sense, because they want long term residents to get those visas that actually cost a lot of money and require you to jump through all kinds of bureaucratic hurdles.

Why would anyone get a long term visa. like those who work, are retired, or married, when you can easily stay almost a full year by using your visa exemptions and then applying for tourist visas? Many Russians, Chinese and Israelis did this exact trick by maxing their stays with visa exempt and tourist visas while working ilegally according to the government

This is exactly what immigration authorities told to a few travellers from my group in summer. I was allowed in with a visa exempt stamp (57 days spent so far in 2025), while the people who stayed more than 100 days in the Kingdom visa exempt and had obtained tourist visas were pulled aside, questioned and let in with a warning to not return again in 2025 with tourist visas

Also the argument that they want you to pay for the tourist visas is ridiculous. The io couldn’t care less if you paid. or not, since none of that money goes to their pockets anyway.

Bottom line is that once you spent more than 90 days in a given year visa exempt, you have absolutely no business returning with a tourist visa

@Jordan ****

what you’re saying makes no sense. If an official visa is available, how is it a cheap trick? It a paid visa with specific requirements and restrictions.

@Bob *********

that’s just speculating, but I know for sure, not from my own experience, but from others, that they don’t find this trick funny, because that’s what it is, a cheap and easy way to stay as much as possible and it does not work for obvious reasons as it would allow you to stay for more than half a year which is ridiculous