The ACAP permit costs NPR 3,000 for foreign nationals and NPR 1,000 for SAARC nationals in 2026. Children under 10 are free. You can buy it online through the NTNC e-permit portal, in person at the NTNC counters in Kathmandu or Pokhara, or through a registered trekking agency. The TIMS card costs NPR 2,000 for individuals and NPR 1,000 for group trekkers, and is now issued only through a registered agency. One ACAP covers every trail inside the Annapurna Conservation Area for a single entry.
That is the short version. The longer version matters, because permit rules in Nepal have shifted more in the last three years than in the twenty before them, and a lot of what you will read online is quietly out of date.
We process these permits every week for our clients, so here is the current picture, written in July 2026.
ACAP and TIMS at a glance (2026 rates)
| Permit | Foreign nationals | SAARC nationals | Children under 10 | Issued by |
| ACAP (Annapurna Conservation Area Permit) | NPR 3,000 | NPR 1,000 | Free | NTNC |
| TIMS card, group rate | NPR 1,000 | NPR 600 approx. | Free | NTB / TAAN |
| TIMS card, individual rate | NPR 2,000 | NPR 1,000 approx. | Free | NTB / TAAN |
A quick note on the dollar figures you will see quoted elsewhere. At mid 2026 exchange rates, NPR 3,000 sits somewhere around USD 22 to 25. Anyone quoting a fixed dollar price is converting, not quoting policy. The fee is set in rupees.
What the ACAP permit actually is
ACAP stands for Annapurna Conservation Area Permit. It is an entry fee, not a trekking licence, and it is issued by the National Trust for Nature Conservation (NTNC), the semi-governmental body that has managed the Annapurna Conservation Area since the project began in 1986.
The conservation area covers roughly 7,629 square kilometres, which makes it the largest protected area in Nepal. It runs from the subtropical valleys around Birethanti up to the arid Tibetan plateau country beyond Jomsom, and it takes in almost every trail people mean when they say “trekking in Annapurna.”
Your fee is not a tax that vanishes into a ministry. NTNC puts it into trail repair, ranger posts, waste management, drinking water schemes and community forestry across the Gurung, Magar and Thakali villages you walk through. It is one of the few tourist charges in Nepal where you can see the output on the ground, usually in the form of a rebuilt stone staircase somewhere above Chhomrong.
One permit, one fee, all Annapurna trails. If you walk Poon Hill first and then continue up to Annapurna Base Camp, you do not buy a second ACAP. It is valid across the whole conservation area on a single entry, for the length of your trip.
ACAP permit cost in 2026
NPR 3,000 per person for foreign nationals. NPR 1,000 for SAARC nationals. Free for children under 10.
Three things trip people up:
- The fee is per entry, not per day. A four-day Ghorepani loop and a twenty-day circuit cost the same.
- It is non-refundable. Once issued, that is it. If your flight is cancelled or you get sick in Pokhara, the money is gone.
- Buying at the trail costs double. If you turn up at a checkpost without a permit, the ranger can issue one on the spot at roughly twice the office rate. Some checkposts will simply turn you around instead. Do not treat this as a backup plan.
If you are paying online, budget for a card gateway surcharge of about 2.9 per cent on top of the fee.
For a region by region comparison covering Everest, Langtang and the restricted zones, see our Nepal trekking permit cost guide.
The TIMS card in 2026: what actually changed
This is where most trekkers get confused, and honestly, with good reason.
TIMS stands for Trekkers’ Information Management System. It is a safety registration run jointly by the Nepal Tourism Board (NTB) and the Trekking Agencies’ Association of Nepal (TAAN). It records your passport details, nationality, route, guide’s name and emergency contact into a central database. If a landslide closes a valley or somebody goes missing, that database is the first thing rescue coordinators open.
Here is the honest state of play.
The old green independent card is gone. It was designed for solo trekkers walking without a guide. Since the mandatory guide rule came in, that category has effectively disappeared. In 2026, every TIMS registration goes through a registered trekking agency. You cannot walk into the Tourism Board and buy one for yourself the way you could in 2019.
It has gone digital. Nepal has been rolling out e-TIMS, a QR-coded record tied to your passport rather than a laminated card. Checkposts scan it.
Enforcement varies by region, and Annapurna is the grey area. In the Everest region, TIMS has been dropped entirely and replaced by the Khumbu Pasang Lhamu Rural Municipality fee alongside the Sagarmatha National Park permit. On the Annapurna trails, operators report that checkposts through 2026 are verifying ACAP and often not asking for TIMS separately. It is still firmly required in Langtang, Manaslu, and far western routes.
Our position, and it is a practical one: we register every client on TIMS anyway. It costs NPR 1,000 at the group rate, takes about ten minutes, and it is the record a helicopter crew searches if something goes wrong at 4,000 metres. Skipping it to save the price of a lunch in Thamel is a strange economy.
If someone tells you confidently that TIMS has been abolished, ask when they last stood at the Birethanti checkpost. The rules are mid transition. The safest reading is that ACAP is the document that gets checked, and TIMS is the document you want to exist if you ever need rescuing.
How to apply for the ACAP permit online
NTNC launched an online permit system in 2024 and rebuilt it in 2025 after a rocky start. It works reasonably well now.
The portal: epermit.ntnc.org.np
What to have ready before you start:
- A digital passport photo (JPEG, plain background)
- A scan or clear photo of your passport bio page
- Your Nepal visa details, if you already have them
- Your route and planned entry date
- A Visa or Mastercard
How it works:
- Register an account on the portal and open a new permit application.
- Fill in passport details, nationality, route, and entry date. Take your time here. Everything is validated against your passport at checkposts, so a typo in your passport number becomes a real problem later.
- Upload your photo and passport scan.
- Choose your payment method. If you select online payment, you pay by card, and the permit arrives in your inbox. If you select counter payment, you still have to visit the office in person and pay cash, so the online step only saves you the form filling.
- Print it. Print two copies. QR verification works well in Pokhara and less well at 3,700 metres in the rain.
Two honest caveats. The portal has a history of struggling under peak season traffic in October, and it does not cover TIMS. TIMS runs on the Nepal Tourism Board side and still routes through a registered agency. Go the DIY route online, and you are half sorted, not fully sorted.
Where to get ACAP and TIMS in person
Kathmandu
Tourist Service Centre, Bhrikutimandap, a short taxi ride from Thamel. The Nepal Tourism Board building houses both the NTNC permit counter and the TIMS desk, which is why most trekkers do their paperwork here in one trip.
- Open Sunday to Friday, roughly 9:00 to 17:00
- Closed Saturdays and public holidays, and Nepal has plenty of public holidays
- Cash only at the counter, Nepali rupees preferred
- Allow 30 to 45 minutes if the queue is short, considerably longer in the first two weeks of October
Pokhara
NTNC office, Lakeside, near the Tourist Police post, with the Nepal Tourism Board office at Damside also handling Annapurna paperwork. If you are flying straight to Pokhara and starting from Nayapul, Kande or Phedi, this is the sensible option. Most of our Pokhara-starting clients finish the permit the afternoon before they walk.
Through your agency
If you have booked a guided trek, this stops being your problem. Send a passport scan and a photo, and both permits are ready when you land. Every Annapurna itinerary we run, from the 14-day Annapurna Base Camp trek to the 16-day Annapurna Circuit, includes permits in the package price.
Documents you need
Keep this list short, and you will not go wrong:
- Original passport, valid for at least six months
- Nepal tourist visa (our Nepal visa guide covers entry options if you have not sorted this yet)
- Passport-size photos. Officially two. Bring four. Between visa on arrival, ACAP, TIMS and whatever local municipality decides to collect a fee this season, you will use them, and the nearest photo studio to Chhomrong is a day and a half away.
- Photocopy of your passport bio page and visa stamp
- Cash in NPR. The counters do not take cards.
- Travel insurance covering high altitude trekking and helicopter evacuation. Not always inspected for ACAP, always required for restricted area permits, and always a good idea above 3,000 metres.
Restricted areas inside Annapurna: two 2026 changes worth knowing
Upper Mustang and Nar Phu sit inside the conservation area but are also restricted zones, which means an ACAP plus a Restricted Area Permit (RAP) issued by the Department of Immigration. Two things changed recently and much of the internet has not caught up.
Upper Mustang pricing was rewritten. The old flat rate of USD 500 for the first ten days was gazetted out in late December 2025 and replaced with USD 50 per person per day, charged only for the days you are actually inside the restricted zone. For a short Lo Manthang itinerary that is a meaningful saving. For a long one, it is not.
Solo trekkers can now hold restricted area permits. On 22 March 2026, the Department of Immigration removed the minimum two trekker group rule that had stood for decades across Nepal’s restricted districts. A single foreign trekker can now hold a RAP in their own name, and applications can be lodged before arrival using visa details.
What has not changed: the permit still has to be applied for by a TAAN registered agency, a licensed guide is still mandatory, and one guide may accompany up to seven trekkers. A solo permit does not mean walking alone.
The mandatory guide rule, plainly stated
Since April 2023, foreign trekkers in Nepal’s national parks and conservation areas must trek with a licensed guide arranged through a registered agency. Through 2026 this is checked at permit counters and at trail checkposts, and the guide’s licence number is recorded against your registration.
You will still find posts from 2022 describing how to walk the Annapurna Sanctuary alone with a paper map and a rented sleeping bag. That era is over. Whatever you make of the policy, the practical reality is that permits are now issued on the assumption a licensed guide is attached to them.
If you are weighing up what a guided trek involves, our notes on trekking grades in Nepal and altitude sickness are a useful place to start.
Checkposts, fines and what rangers actually look at
On the Annapurna Base Camp route, expect permit checks at or near:
- Birethanti or Nayapul, the standard entry point
- Jhinu Danda and Chhomrong, the main mid-trail checkposts
- Bamboo or Dovan, before the upper sanctuary
- Additional posts on the Circuit at Dharapani, Chame and Jomsom
Rangers scan or record your ACAP against your passport and log your entry. Two minutes if your paperwork is in order.
Trekking without a valid permit brings an on-the-spot fine, commonly around double the original fee, and the ranger is within their rights to send you back down the valley. There is no grace period and no pay later arrangement. Keep the permit in a ziplock bag. Paper and Himalayan weather are not friends.
Booking with an agency versus doing it yourself
Being straight with you: if you are an experienced trekker who has hired a guide privately and only needs the conservation permit, the NTNC portal will get you there. That is a legitimate route, and we are not going to pretend otherwise.
What an agency saves you is the friction. We hold the paperwork, front the fees, deal with the counter on a Friday afternoon when the queue is out the door, and fix problems when a checkpost queries something. Our clients arrive in Kathmandu, hand over a passport, and never think about permits again.
Everything on our Annapurna trekking page includes ACAP, TIMS, a government-licensed guide and full trail logistics. If you would rather talk it through before committing, send us your dates, and we will come back with a plan and an honest cost breakdown.
Frequently asked questions
How much does the ACAP permit cost in 2026?
NPR 3,000 for foreign nationals, NPR 1,000 for SAARC nationals, and free for children under 10. Add roughly 2.9 per cent if you pay by card on the online portal.
Can I get the ACAP permit online?
Yes. NTNC runs an official e-permit portal at epermit.ntnc.org.np. You upload a passport photo and passport scan, enter your route, pay by Visa or Mastercard, and receive the permit by email. Choose the online payment option, because the counter payment option still requires an office visit.
Is the TIMS card still required in 2026?
Officially it remains part of the trekking registration system, but enforcement is inconsistent. Everest region checkposts no longer ask for it, and several Annapurna checkposts through 2026 verify ACAP only. It is still actively required in Langtang, Manaslu and far western Nepal. Since it is now issued only through a registered agency and costs NPR 1,000 at the group rate, most trekkers simply have their operator arrange it.
Do I need a separate permit for Poon Hill and ABC on the same trip?
No. One ACAP covers every route inside the Annapurna Conservation Area for the duration of a single entry, so combining Poon Hill with Annapurna Base Camp costs nothing extra in permits.
Where do I get ACAP and TIMS in Kathmandu?
The Tourist Service Centre at Bhrikutimandap, near Thamel. It houses the NTNC permit counter and the TIMS desk. Open Sunday to Friday, cash only, closed Saturdays and public holidays.
Where do I get them in Pokhara?
The NTNC office at Lakeside, near the Tourist Police post, with the Nepal Tourism Board office at Damside also handling Annapurna paperwork. Most Pokhara-based trekkers complete it the day before they start walking.
What happens if I trek without a permit?
You will be stopped at a checkpost. Expect an on-the-spot fine of roughly double the standard fee, and the ranger can refuse entry and send you back. There is no option to pay later.
Can I trek Annapurna Base Camp without a guide in 2026?
No. Since April 2023, foreign trekkers in Nepal’s national parks and conservation areas must trek with a licensed guide from a registered agency, and this is checked at permit issue and on the trail.
How long is the ACAP permit valid?
It is a single-entry permit valid for your trip inside the conservation area. Leave the area and re-enter later, and you need a new one.
Do children need an ACAP permit?
Children under 10 are exempt from the fee, but their details should still be registered at the permit office.
Sorted permits, then just walk
Permits are the least interesting part of an Annapurna trek and the easiest part to get wrong. Get them right in Kathmandu or Pokhara and you will not think about paperwork again until you are back down in Nayapul with tired legs.
We have been running treks out of Thamel for twenty five years, and permits are handled as standard on every Annapurna itinerary we operate. Tell us your dates, your fitness and how many days you have, and we will build the route around it.
Plan your Annapurna trek with us or browse the full range of trekking in Nepal options.
Official sources: NTNC e-permit portal | Nepal Tourism Board | Trekking Agencies’ Association of Nepal | Department of Immigration