The Embassy of Pakistan in Abu Dhabi and the Consulate General of Pakistan in Dubai have started issuing electronic passports to Pakistani citizens living in the UAE, with services rolling out from October 23, 2026.
The most affordable option is the 5-year, 36-page e-passport at a normal fee of AED 145, roughly Rs. 11,020 at current exchange rates. Fees rise with longer validity, more pages, and faster processing. A 10-year, 36-page book costs AED 215 normally or AED 355 for urgent processing, while the 72-page versions range from AED 260 to AED 635 depending on validity and speed.
Replacing a lost e-passport costs significantly more. Applicants reporting a first loss pay double the standard fee, while a second loss quadruples it. The steepest charge is AED 2,540 — about Rs. 193,040 — for an urgent 10-year, 72-page passport being replaced after a second loss.
Existing machine-readable Pakistani passports will remain valid until their expiry dates, so there is no need to rush for a replacement. Applicants have been advised to apply for renewal only when their current passports have less than six months of validity remaining. To qualify for an e-passport, applicants must provide both their first and last names.
The launch matters because the UAE hosts one of the largest Pakistani expatriate communities in the world, and passport services rank among the most-used consular facilities. Long queues and processing delays have been a recurring complaint, and the introduction of e-passports brings the missions in line with the biometric document standards now common worldwide.
Electronic passports embed a chip carrying the holder’s biometric data, making them harder to forge and generally faster to process at immigration counters. Pakistan began rolling out e-passports domestically in recent years, and extending issuance to key overseas missions has been a long-standing demand of the diaspora.
Pakistan began issuing e-passports domestically in recent years as part of a wider modernisation of travel documents, and demand from overseas Pakistanis has been building ever since. For the diaspora, the e-passport is more than a convenience — it determines how smoothly they clear immigration in the Gulf states, where biometric checks are increasingly the norm at airports and border posts.
Applicants in the UAE will deal directly with the Pakistani missions in Abu Dhabi and Dubai, which have now been equipped to enrol biometrics and issue the chip-embedded booklets. Because the fee depends on the combination of page count, validity period, and processing speed, travellers are advised to work out which option suits them before visiting — particularly those replacing lost passports, where the surcharges climb steeply.
Pakistani citizens in the UAE can check the embassy’s official fee page for the full schedule before applying. With the fee structure now public, applicants can choose the combination of validity, pages, and processing speed that best fits their travel needs — and their budget.
