UK ETA App Reviews

Crashes half way through. I’ve tried to use this multiple times and it gets to the picture section and then stops working & says it’s unavailable and to try again later. It will also only read my chip if my passport is open and I put it on the first page. It won’t work if I follow the instructions.

This might help you:. For US passports: you probably do have the chip if u got it in the last few years Take your phone and scan it on the back flap of the passport (inside with the earth and satellite image). Took 2 tries for me. The chip is in the middle/top of the back page Good luck!

Frustrating and infuriating. This was awful. You don’t find out you need to remove the phone case until it’s time to read the chip. It took me 5 minutes to get the case off and then the chip reader didn’t even work. The remaining process was ok. You need to start the instructions with “remove your phone from its case. “ Next it should say, “the chip reader may not work. If it doesn’t, just answer the questions,”

Speedy Turnaround, Malfunctioning Chip Feature. The chip feature does not work! I had to say my passport did not have a chip, and confirm manually my passport numbers. It worked fine and I got my approval soon after submitting my application. So if the chip reader is not working for you, restart the application and hit “No” when it asks if you have a passport with a chip. I hope this feature is fixed soon! The rest of the process I went through with no errors.

Open the cover to scan the chip. The app tells you to place your phone on the front of your closed passport to scan the embedded chip, but that didn’t work for me. But once I opened the cover and placed it on that plastic page with all your data, it immediately worked.

NFC SCAN LOCATION. Be advised the NFC chip on new US passports is inside the back cover of the passport and usually near the top. If using an iPhone with NFC chip, the chip is in the top bezel. SO: open the back cover of the passport and scan using the top of the iPhone. When you hit the chip the app will tell you to “stop moving.” You really have to hit this spot on for it to work. The directions to lay the phone on the passport don’t work.

Easy peasy. If you can follow very clear directions this is easy peasy. If US passport, the chip is in back cover near the middle. Just slowly move your phone to find it. I got approved in less than five minutes.

Wonky chip reading. I applied last night I had all sorts of trouble getting the chip to read. I tried for several minutes every which way to no avail. My wife applied several days before me, and she had similar issues. I asked her what her trick was, and she said just skip. She had done that and didn’t have any issues getting approved pretty quickly. So I followed her advice, and just skipped, and went through the rest of the process. Everything went through just fine, and I ended up being approved within a minute. I hadn’t even gotten my credit card back in my wallet before I got the approval email. That part was quick and over all the whole process was simple and straightforward overall. (And I even got approved more quickly than she did). Fix the chip reading part of this app, and it gets at least four stars. Looking forward to my trip to the UK in the upcoming months!

Confused. Application process went smoothly and accepted payment via Apple Pay then received an error that the system was busy. Meanwhile, received an email that application was processing. A couple minutes later, received email saying the visa was approved. Soooo…I suppose it’s approved?

Poor chip reader - Rejection. ** Update on earlier review, with a suggestion (which I found on another site). The biometric scan did work and I did get an almost immediate approval, BUT, I scanned the opened inside of the passport cover, not the closed outside, as the directions specifically instructed. Perhaps the US passports are different. Don’t know. Not a techie. —— Please listen to the feedback and get this fixed. After too many failed efforts at getting the app to read the biometric chip, I decided to “skip” that element like others have suggested. And after paying the $20 fee and submitting, it was immediately rejected. Poor app. Wasted money.

The App is terrrible. Don’t use the app follow fine print to do it online. The app has a scan chip of passport process that does work. It has to fail 3 times before they allow you to skip the process. The app only allows a Live Photo only and it has to be against a white backdrop. It failed 3 times for me. Then it said I couldn’t use for 24 hours. Online allows existing photos.

Won’t read biometric chip consistently. We’ve done three passports in a row and despite positioning them the same way for each separate process, it took different times to read the chips and these are passports from the same nationality (presumably the chip is located in the same place) and the same phone was used. For first passport took three tries, the second took about 10, the second took maybe 30 tries and needed to shut down the app once in the midst of it to restart the process from the start. Every time too it failed to read the chip the message would be that the phone or passport were moved even though that wasn’t the case for 99% of the attempts. So this app is in dire need of fixing how it reads the biometric chip as it was a frustrating process. The app should also have a section to enter the authorization’s reference number and maybe some associated info such as the last name or passport number or date of birth to be able to retrieve the ETA and know what the validity is instead of merely needing to go back to my email to find it.

Chip issue - Fix your US Passport Instructions. USA Users: *Open to the plastic page for the chip scan* The instruction to remove your phone case is completely valid - glad it’s there. But scanning the cover for a chip didn’t work. I guess some passports have the chip built into the cover, but most nowadays have a plastic info/photo page with the chip built in. As soon as I scanned the chip on that page (instead of going through the cover), it read my chip immediately. My husband just did the same application for an Australian ETA and their instructions were clear on opening to that page. Please update your instructions.

Needs additional instruction. I successfully and quickly used the app without issue ONLY AFTER I read a review stating that when using an American passport one must scan the inside of the back cover to read the chip. Developers: please include this instruction so the user experience and success rate will increase dramatically.

Scan is Tricky. The app made it very easy to apply for the visa. I’d recommend to do the app versus web browser. The scanning portion never worked for me regardless of inside our outside the cover but I’m glad the other reviews advised to click “skip”. You can skip after a few scanning tries and that doesn’t impact your approval. You just have to answer a few questions but that’s it. Easy peasy. My approval came back in 5 minutes post submission.

Chip reader is fine, use it inside back cover. I see lots of complaints about the chip reader. For my US passport, the chip reader worked fine when I placed my phone against the inside of the back cover page. It’s probably not a problem with the app, but with the strength of the reader in your phone and where the chip is placed inside the passport. I would given this 5 starts except after I finish my application, I immediately tried to apply for my son, and the app said it was too busy and to come back later.

Biometric chip issues bypass. With regard to previous reviews, complaining about the biometric chip, I agree it is flaky, but you can bypass that and confirm details manually in the next step. Therefore, the overall process works well.

Scan the inside back cover for USA. Tried scamming several times the way that they said they did not work. The only thing that works was when I scanned the inside cover of the passport and then it was able to read the chip! this is for USA passports. I don’t know about others, but that’s how it worked.

Needs Improvement. The scanning of the chip did not work no matter how hard I tried. Had to give up and say that the passport has no chip. Also, does not allow for entering multiple members of the same family with any sharing of information. You have to enter each person completely separately from beginning to end, including payment details. That takes a lot longer than it needs to.

Chip reading process issue. App worked very well but failed the chip reading step for 2 separate applications. However, was given the option to skip that step after several tries and it looks like the data was captured successfully at some point. This was with USA documents so I assume some differences with the chip used.

Refuses to take passport picture. I’ve just spent 45 minutes, trying to get it to take the automatic picture of my passport information page. I’ve tried every angle and multiple light situations, nothing. Rebooted the phone, still nothing. Nobody else seems to be mentioning this problem, but I cannot see that I’m doing anything wrong. I scanned documents all the time using my phone in other apps. i’m giving up, and will try the website.

Tip for US PASSPORTS. If you’re a USA passport holder, when it asks to scan the biometric chip, open to the very last page of your passport (where there is a barcode on the bottom of the page), and put your phone either directly on the barcode or slowly drag your phone across the page. It works, but you might have to give it a couple of tries! The chip scanner will NOT work if you scan the cover of the passport. Good luck!

Worked like a charm. I don’t usually review apps but when this one worked flawlessly and I saw the low scores I had to come back to tell my tale. If you follow the app instructions implicitly (yes I actually removed my phone case for the first time since I put it on) and don’t move the phone once it finds the chip in the passport it takes less than 10 minutes to submit the application and I got my approval email while I was typing this review! Literally one minute after submitting.

Will not read the chip in my passport. Wasted A LOT of time trying to get this to work. None of us could get this to read the chip in our passports. Shocking that this is what they expect you to use- it was not ready to be rolled out! When it asks you to give feedback to improve the app, I could not because there is no option under the citizenship question to select that you are a US citizen so that you can continue???

Before you download this app keep in mind who it’s for. This is not for US passports yet. There are only 4 or so countries that can use the app. Do some due diligence on if you even need to get an ETA before you complain.

Very fiddly. Never could get it to read my chip and after more than a dozen tries, I’m still battling to take a picture it will accept. I’ve taken selfies for visas for many countries as well as for a new US passport when mine needed to be renewed and never had this much trouble getting software to accept a picture. Parameters need tweaking.

Worked. Wasn’t able to get the app to read my chip but was able to skip that section and was approved less than 5 minutes after applying.

Was approved in less than 1 minute. Yes, the chip recognition did not work. But skipping it and entering the information manually only takes a few seconds. Pay with Apple Pay and, with what I experienced, you will get approved within a minute

Couldn’t read chip. Applying was fairly easy but was never able to read chip in passport with the app. Also, I’m approved but now where can I see my ETA for use on travel? No explanation about that and when I open the app it just takes me back to the application.

Okay. Self explanatory, easy to get through except the chip reading part. That definitely does not work but you have to try like 4 times in order to be able to bypass. Took like 30 mins to get through it all for my family of 4. Nice that they accept Apple Pay.

Unnecessary App. Micro chip reader did not work when scanning my passport, even after taking my phone case off. Luckily I was able to skip this part of the application. The app is used to submit ETA application only, once submitted it refreshes to application page. It would be nice if the app saved your application/ETA file. Unfortunately you have to refer to the confirmation email for your ETA details… I would reccomend applying online if you’re able, instead of downloading the app. My application was approved within 30 minutes of applying.

Unusable. I downloaded the app to apply for my ETA. After at least four attempts, I used the online version and was successful after only two attempts. The items i had trouble with: Verification - when interesting information such as email address, phone number, and/ or payment information the app wanted to send a verification email or text. I had to leave the app to retrieve the verification number. When I returned the app would just buffer. Scan passport chip - was never successful at scanning the chip. Payment - attempted three different credit cards without success. I think this was due to the time required for the app to communicate with the the card company. The app always times out before verification was made. The online site was only slightly better.

US passport scanning tip. If you are an American and having difficulty scanning the chip on your passport, open up the passport to the back cover (with the moon and earth) and scan there. I was having difficulty as well until I did that, and the app was able to scan my passport chip fairly quickly!

Scan back of US Passports. Easy app to use. The only hiccup was with scanning the passport chip. For US passports, don’t follow on screen instructions. Instead, open passport to the past page and scan where the barcode is.

Does not accept my US credit card.. The accuracy of instruction in the app needs improvement to make it compatible with US passport. You need to learn where the chip is located in passports of each country. I apply for ETA outside the US and the app always declined my US as well as foreign credit cards. Regardless of currency I chose or address put in. ***You need to fix this glitch.*** Is UK a developing country?

That was easy. This was super easy. Only giving four stars because reading the biometric chip did not work for either passport. I kind of felt like I was on Candid Camera being told to do something ridiculous with my phone! Not sure what part of my phone is supposed to connect to what part of the passport. But the good news is that after three tries, it let me skip it and said I might have to answer additional questions. The rest of the process was quick and easy. The applications were approved within five minutes.

Perfect app. Ok I never write reviews. But seeing so many negative ones I had to help the next person. A lot of folks think your chip is front of passport where the chip symbol is. Everyone’s is different. Mine was in the back of the book toward the right hand side. The second I learned this, the second it was detected! Smooth sailing! I think these are user errors. The app works great, and I love the apple may and modernity of it overall. Nice work! Good luck to the next traveler!

Super easy. It wouldn’t scan my chip, but I still was able to submit an application in <5 minutes. Very easy to use.

US chip on INSIDE BACK COVER BY BARCODE. App works great once you figure out that US passports have the chip on the inside back cover near the barcode and not on the front cover like the app specifies. Take security stickers off back (if you have any), open passport to inside back cover and scan above the barcode area. Thank heavens for the Reddit thread that noted this! *Rec’d approval before I was done typing this review!

App is not user friendly. App was absolutely not user friendly. I helped my mother apply for the eta using the app and it took at least 5 attempts. Tips for others: when scanning the passport chip place your phone down on a table and move the passport from bottom to top slowly and stop moving it as soon as the app says it’s accessing the chip. Also, if your credit card requires email/phone authentication do not move away from the app screen, use another device otherwise you’ll lose the entire application process. Not sure if the online application is better or not but make sure you have some time and patience if you want to use the app.

Chip scanning for United States passports. To scan for the biometric chip for US passports you need to open to the last page of your passport and scan near the barcode. Three of us were able to scan the chip in our passports within seconds

Need to be improved. The App idea is great but the process is not. First it does take a long time after pressing “my passport has biometric chip” then it won’t scan my passport as it’s always give me an error message says “unable to take an image - there may be a problem with the format of your document or with your device.” I hope you could fix this errors soon. Thank you,

Where to scan the chip (US Passport). The chip in the US passport is at the bottom of the back cover. Open the passport and place phone at the bottom of the back cover to get the reading.

For US passports: make sure to use the top black flap for the scan!!. Tried so many times and it didn’t work with their instructions, but thankfully found a super helpful review that advised to try opening the back flap of your passport and it immediately worked!

Works, kind of. The app eventually worked. UI isn’t fantastic, but it still only took a few minutes to submit, and a few more minutes to get approved. Easy enough!

Works……eventually. App continually indicates states the chip on the back page of a US passport is isn’t reading, except when you hit skip in order to enter all the information manually, and it goes to the next page, it shows that it did indeed read the chip. So basically you can’t trust what it’s telling you.

Doesn’t save your progress and my credit card kept getting declined. The app doesn’t save your progress, and my credit card kept getting declined for fraudulent purchase attempts despite me clearing them with my cardholder! Gave up after 3 full attempts getting all the way to the payment portion with no success. Also, they tell you to scan your passport from the outside cover. That didn’t work for me. I scanned mine from the inside of the passport, the page across from my photo page, and that’s where it worked. The chip may not be in the cover of your passport. Please update this app - I’m going to try back in a few months…

Works Great. I downloaded the app, follow all the instructions, the Chip part of the process did not work for me, so I skip, the part and enter it manually. And after I paid. My application was approved within minutes. Thank you

Good App, easy to use. The app was great with easy instructions to follow. Only problem I had was reading the chip. After hitting skip, I verified some information and chip was not needed. Lost one star because of problem reading chip. I actually want to say 4 1/2 because instructions are so easy to follow.

Open and scan the inside of passport for chip scan. This all was slick the only frustrating thing was the chip scan but open passport and scan photo and signature page during chip reading and it should work for US passports.

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App continually crashes. Just poor, app crashes at multiple points. Didn’t manage to get completed. Waste of time

No Problems For Me. Just downloaded the app, submitted my application which was smooth and easy. It was approved within 10 minutes. I had no problem with the app and found it very easy to use.

Obtuse !. Attempting to download the App from the Apple Store gets you are far as the download. There after a notice to the effect that ‘This App is busy…try again later…’, so following that advice I tried again. Finally, the function materialises, but after genuflecting to all the fields to load the required documents, the ‘payment’ section closes down when attempting get my bank’s security code to complete the transaction. No wonder inflatable boats are so popular…

Terrible!. App froze 6 times on the last step, I then tried on the website and was able to submit on first try, if you want to waste your time use this app

Worst app I have ever used.. Do not waste your time using this appalling app. Apply online using a computer instead.

UK ETA. Worked well. Easy and quick application process

Frustrating!!!. As soon as you go to retrieve a NetCode at the final step to pay it freezes the app and you have to start all over again. Tried to find a web option but the website directs you to the app.

Useless app. The app refuses to take a photograph of my passport despite following the process correctly & trying numerous times. What a waste of time ……

Amazing work!. When I started to researched about UK’s immigration policy for travel to UK, I followed on what these information were saying, I searched this app and downloaded, I followed the instructions to completed my application on UK ETA app and then two mins later, I received the email from them and it went approved after I completed my application under one minute. Such an amazing app you’ve made! Nothing problem at all, easiest and cheapest way to payment and complete the application. I’d give this 100 out of 10 stars. A highest recommendation if you want travel to UK, this one is the best option for ya, mate!

Security code freezes app. Unusable if the overseas transaction on card requires a banking code sent to your phone. App cannot handle that. Will try again after its updated or use online instead if its not

Really easy with this app. Worked brilliantly. Very easy to use and no problem at all.

Frozen app. Agree with the previous review. Still freezing at the payment stage

Reduces the hassle. The ability to easily capture photo, scan passport chip, and apple pay is really great. The face scan is an over the top intrusion though.

Hopeless. Crashes when I got to pay, tried several times. Useless

App Crashes at payment. App worked fine until (like others have stated) you need to pay and then it crashes - not allowing you to enter in your netcode for payment.

Idk why people don’t like this. It was awesome, so quick and did it under 30 min, They scan your passport which is super awesome, so much better than the old passports

Not user friendly. App kept crashing

Don’t bother downloading if you are an Aussie!!!. App doesn’t let Australians apply for an ETA. You have to use the website method.

Worked perfectly. Had no issues on an Iphone in Australia doing this, took me a couple of minutes. The app was great to use.

Very confusing. On UK gov page it says all Australian citizens need ETA, but on the app it says we don’t need an ETA. What should I do?

UNUSABLE. Fails at payment. REPEATEDLY.. Tried at least 8 times on different days using my phone. 2 step authorisation required for payment and as soon as you exit to obtain approval code or in app auth via my bank, I he app fails and have to start all over again. Had to revert to web application and it was equally as frustrating. Total FAIL.

Payments are broken. The app breaks when trying to approve payment in banking app. Baffling this made it out into the wild.

App freezes at payment page. Tried 3 times and each time when I went to get bank code when returned to app it was frozen. Will have to revert to applying thru website Needs fixing asap

Quick and Easy. Whole process very quick and intuitive to complete. Had my ETA in under five minutes. The complaint about the Netbank codes taking you out of the app and forcing you to start again is valid so that bug needs to be fixed.

Good reason to avoid the UK. Painful on multiple fronts. Just more wasted time. App rolling out at different times for different countries. More pain for my family. Why do they need to store this data? They check it when you arrive. They think they won’t be hacked/people won’t be scammed. A total joke.

Hmmm. Great app UNTIL you get all the way to the end to pay and it just lags and lags and lags……………….. time for an update guys! Do I have a visa submission now or what? Who knows?

App crashes at payment. App is great until you have to pay! Crashes each time as I need to enter a bank security code. I see this has been reported before. I would have expected this to have been fixed by now. I couldn’t even pay with Apple Pay! Quite annoying!

Frustrating time waster. I tried 3 times and each time entered all details correctly but wasn’t able to complete payment

Payment crashes app. I’d give it 5 stars up until the payment page. Left the app to get the required banking code, came back to find it spinning, rendering the entire app useless unless you can get your code sent to a different phone.

Fix your app!. Would have given this zero stars if I could. There is a known problem in the app about retrieving the payment code then not being able to enter into the app. It’s still not fixed! There was an option to use Apple Pay at the payment step so I thought I’d take that option….didn’t work! So had to use the credit card option and ran into the same problem as everyone else is having. Off to the website then.

Easy to use for Australians. Easy to use with clear instructions. As an Australian. Received ETA in 11 minutes on 29/11. Another family member received ETA in one minute. Perhaps person trying to apply on 27/11 tried before 11am (midnight in UK) or used the previous version. It was updated on 27/11.

Credit card confirmation hangs app. After getting to the payment stage, I entered my credit card details. My credit card provider sends a text with a confirmation code to be entered. As soon as I access the text message the payment confirmation screen in the app disappears and I cannot complete the transaction. Had to start the application all over again and use a payment method that sends a message to a different phone. A pretty basic failing for this app.

App Freezes at Final Payment Stage – Extremely Frustrating. As soon as you switch windows to retrieve your netcode for completing a payment, the app freezes, forcing you to start the entire process over. I’ve already tried filling in my details twice and haven’t been successful so far. This issue not only wastes time but defeats the purpose of using the app for convenience. Considering the website encourages users to switch to the app as a “faster method,” this flaw needs urgent attention from the development team. For now, I’ll have to revert to the traditional online method, which seems more reliable despite being slower. Please fix this critical issue promptly to improve the user experience.

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Parts of the app are flakey. The first part of the application process is ok but the payment processing part is flakey. It keeps crashing the app and you have to start the whole process over again. You only get 3 tries and it warns it will put you in a 24 hour timeout. Fortunately I got through on the third try.

Doesn’t work!. When I try to open the app to apply for my ETA, it just says “Sorry, this service isn’t available”. I have an iPhone 12, iOS 18.1.1., and enough storage so there’s no reason why it shouldn’t work!

Annoyed Customer. I am extremely frustrated with the UK ETA app. The passport picture feature simply doesn’t work. Despite trying over 100 times, it keeps giving the error message "Unable to take a picture of the document." The app is clearly not functioning as advertised, and this has made the entire process incredibly frustrating. It's disappointing that such a crucial feature is unreliable. I would not recommend this app until they fix this issue. Please fix this in your next release!

Lots of Bugs. I could not make the payment and had to restart all over again. The programmers didn’t test it properly. Have Fun trying to get your ETA visa . Not a good experience

Took a few tries. This app is nowhere near as good compared to the equivalent USA app. Took multiple tries, had trouble detecting the passport chip, needed to take a few photos before it accepted one finally, and it crashed while I was trying to pay.

Good App. I’m waiting on my reply back for the ETA but the app was very easy to use and Apple Pay worked well and everything worked well. People who said they were having a hard time with the app can’t be serious.

Works great. As a Customer Service Agent that works at an airport, it straight forward. The only hard parts is taking a photo of the passport (which is normal), and scanning the biometric chip, which you hold roughly in the middle of your phone. But the text is a great size to read, easy to follow. The people that have problems must not know what they are doing.

Surprisingly smooth!. Honestly I had low expectations for a government app, but this was a really smooth experience (at least for me)! My compliments to the development team!

Doesn’t even work. Open the app just for the app to say “You currently can’t apply for an ETA on the app” ??????

Take payment but don’t let you apply. The system allowed me to go through the entire application process, take a credit card payment and then sent a message that I was unable to apply at this time, “the service is busy”.

Can't take photo of passport. It will not work after trying many many times

My face often doesn’t meet the requirements 🙃. Other than repetitively telling me my face doesn’t meet the requirements, and the double charge notification (might’ve been my bank’s fault), the process was pretty smooth. I thought reading the biometric chip in the passport was pretty cool, I didn’t even know my passport had a chip. The backend systems after applying seem pretty quick and efficient because I got an approval within minutes. I don’t appreciate the double currency conversion fee I experience as a Canadian (pounds to USD to CAD). Overall a decent experience!

Necessary if travelling to UK. Quite straightforward. You’ll be submitting a passport scan, a 3D headshot scan, a selfie and the usual personal info such as mailing address etc. if you’re Canadian, don’t won’t about the Province (it doesn’t need it). One last thing - it asks you for payment info …select UK as the originating Country (otherwise you get charged in $USD).

Did not like this app. It wouldn’t work on my iPad. It would only work on my iPhone. The print is small. The print is not dark enough to read. It has no back button so I couldn’t go back to see what I had in there. There should be some exemption when you’re going for less than a week we’re only going for three days. Why do we have to fill in an app like this. When I went to the UK 10 years ago, we didn’t have to do anything like this. Why do we have to do it now. It really doesn’t make me want to ever go back. What a load of malarkey I already have an Nexis they should be able to trunk into that. What a waste of my time and I can’t even go in to see what I put in because it doesn’t allow you to do that.

No place for Canadian Province. The app is excellent except there is nowhere to indicate in your address what province you are from in Canada. And as we all know, there are many towns in Canada with the same name! Otherwise this app deserves a 5 star. This issue should be very easy to solve. Let’s see how long it takes to correct.

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Read this, there’s a trick to it. I had trouble scanning the chip on my passport. The app says to keep your passport closed and shows a video of the phone scanning the front cover. I did this multiple times and no chip was found. I ended up opening my passport and faced it down with both front and back hard covers facing up. Once I did this, I found the chip right away. Mine ended up being in the back cover.

Got approval within 3 minutes.. I wonder why the rating for this app is very low. The app was very easy to use. I got the approval within 3 minutes of submitting it. Be sure there is someone to take your picture using the smart phone camera.

Quick and Easy. I don’t understand the low ratings. The process was quick and easy. It took less than 10 minutes. I was approved almost instantly. Make sure you have your phone touch the back cover of your passport in order to scan the chip.

Quick and Easy!. Did my application on an iPhone 12 Pro Max and had no issues at all! Took about 5 minutes from start to payment. The app was very clear on what I needed to do, and it informed me if I needed to retake my photo or if it wasn’t clear.

Needs additional instruction. I successfully and quickly used the app without issue ONLY AFTER I read a review stating that when using an American passport one must scan the inside of the back cover to read the chip. Developers: please include this instruction so the user experience and success rate will increase dramatically.

Worked great - easy and quick. Don’t get scammed by the lots of sites that charge you extra fees. This is the official one. Take the case off your phone if you have issues scanning the chip. For US passports line up the top of the phone with around the middle of the back page.

super fast and rly quick approval. I was stressed cause my flight is leaving tonight and I JUST found out I need an ETA. Reading online that it can take up to three days for ETA to process and stressing I’ll have to reschedule. Applied through this app in 2 mins and got approval in 5 mins. Amazing system - I’m all for safe traveling and quick, easy logistics. 10/10

Easy once you know where chip is.. US passports have the chip in the back cover near the barcode. Once you know this it is simple. Would be nice if you could apply for your whole family at once, rather than going through the entire process entering duplicate info for every family member but otherwise smooth and got automated approvals quickly.

Worked perfectly. Did two applications for UK ETA. Both were completed in about 10 minutes and approved in about a minute. Very easy if you know a couple things. First, if the app says problem after taking a photo (both passport and face) retake the photo until it says it’s OK. Don’t submit a photo if doesn’t say approved. Take pictures in bright light, like near a window. And position so no reflections. For your face photo, make sure there is no shadow on a plain wall behind you. Lastly, this is the official UK gov app. It cost £20 each. Others apps often cost several times more.

iPhone 14 or newer is best to use for scanning the passport. So people are complaining that the phone will not scan the chip on the passport. I found that you need at least an iPhone 14 or newer for the phone to scan the chip on the passport. Other than that the app works fine and it gets the job done.

Nice app. Worked smoothly and easily!. I don’t know why this app got poor reviews. Maybe it was earlier versions. This one ( April 2025 ) worked flawlessly! The chip is now read from the LAST page of the passport, not the front, or information page. I did not mine and my wife’s in less than 10 minutes.

Fantastic. This app was so fast and easy to get my family of 4 approved to travel to the UK for holiday. I can’t believe some people have this app bad reviews because this was the easiest and quickest process I’ve ever had to get a visa approval. Definitely 5 star rating. Well done!!🙌✌️

Does Exactly What it Needs to Do. Not sure why there are so many poor reviews of this app. It does exactly what you need it to do, it’s extremely simple to follow the directions. I had no issues whatsoever. I would imagine a lot of people are just giving bad reviews because they’re upset about the requirement to apply for an ETA.

Speedy Turnaround, Malfunctioning Chip Feature. The chip feature does not work! I had to say my passport did not have a chip, and confirm manually my passport numbers. It worked fine and I got my approval soon after submitting my application. So if the chip reader is not working for you, restart the application and hit “No” when it asks if you have a passport with a chip. I hope this feature is fixed soon! The rest of the process I went through with no errors.

Tip for US passports. When it came to scanning the chip i flipped open to the very back and i put my phone camera (iphone) right on top of my passport number with the barcode thats at the bottom of the back cover. It took the chip right away. After i submitted the application i was approved in a minute.

Solid user experience, but won’t scan passport. Well-designed, easy to use. Accepts Apple Pay. I tried scanning my passport’s chip 6-7 times and even tried rebooting my iPhone, which meant I had to start the process over. I followed the instructions carefully, but it couldn’t read the chip. If the scan worked, the app would deserve 5 stars

Jersey Rican. I have no idea why this app has such a low rating. It was super easy and only took me 5 minutes to complete and I received the decision in my email almost instantly. One tip you have to put the camera on the back page with your cell phone half way up the page.

US chip on INSIDE BACK COVER BY BARCODE. App works great once you figure out that US passports have the chip on the inside back cover near the barcode and not on the front cover like the app specifies. Take security stickers off back (if you have any), open passport to inside back cover and scan above the barcode area. Thank heavens for the Reddit thread that noted this! *Rec’d approval before I was done typing this review!

Doesn’t work. It takes forever to get through all of the steps. Scanning your face, finding the barcode takes forever to get it to work. I finally managed to get all of that to work, and I get towards the end where you have to enter the country where you are going. We are going to the United Kingdom. It’s a drop-down, and you can’t type in your own country. You have to select from the list England, United Kingdom, Great Britain are not one of the selections. So I can’t move on. Absurd.

Grateful for the app.. I am pleased with the app. Like someone else commented I didn’t know about this until two weeks prior to leaving for the UK. After a major panic attack the process was quick and my approval was through in less than 5 mins.

Works great. I got the ETA approved about five minutes after I opened the app. I saw reviews saying that you need iPhone 14 or newer to scan the passport chip, but my iPhone 11 worked fine after a bit of moving around on the passport cover. This app is a stupendous achievement for UK bureaucracy, which usually makes you do everything on paper over a period of months!

Horrible App. Does not work with my USA passport and iPhone 14 pro. Failed to scan the chip in my passport. I tried many times. I removed the iPhone cover. I turned bluetooth off. I did my best to follow the poor instructions. Do they realize that iPhones are not flat?? Apparently not. The “top” of my phone will not touch the passport if I lsy it flat because of the camera lenses. Failed every time. So when I finally gave up and tried the alternative method of supplying more information or confirming my information I did that but then it just dumped me out of the app to the beginning UGH UGH UGH HORRIBLE!!!!!

Efficient but chip scan didn’t work. I appreciate UKVI’s work to make this process quick and easy! I was approved almost immediately, which was fantastic. However, the passport chip never scanned, no matter me following all instructions and attempting multiple times over the course of two days. I’m sharing this feedback in case it helps to fix any app bugs. Thanks!

Super easy, 3min application. The low ratings must be from visa-processing third party companies trying to boost their own apps/services. Super easy process, take a few photos, scan your passport chip, type in your address, and answer a few questions. 3 minutes.

Very buggy. It took me at least 16 attempts, a few hours, multiple attempts on the online alternative, and paying twice (once via the website and once via the app) before I finally got it to work. My 15 year old son’s online application was instantly approved while mine was not, which convinced me to give this incredibly frustrating app yet another try. In the meantime we got to the point of contemplating him visiting London while I just waited in the airport. I can see from the reviews I’m not the only one who has struggled to use this. Please fix the bugs!

Need to update directions. If you have a newer US passport that has a hard plastic page that’s what you’re supposed to scan with the back of your phone not the cover. The cover actually will block the signal. It would be nice for the app to have updated directions.

Not bad at all.. The process is not bad at all. Like most things that use your passport only small hangup was finding the chip to scan on my passport with my phone; instead of scanning photo side of passport scan the other side and I was able to find my chip. I was approved in less then 5 min after submitting.

Works flawlessly. I was skeptical about using the app based on the ratings but it just works as expected. Within minutes, I applied and got approved ETAs for a family of four. I had to do them individually so some steps were repetitive but other than that it was a smooth experience.

Fast but not uncomplicated. From the time I downloaded the app until my ETA was approved (that is, the entire process) took 16 minutes. That said, trying to get my passport chip scanned took 8 of those minutes and was a complete waste of time. When you get to that part just choose the ‘skip’ option and continue on.

It worked instantly the 1st time. After reading several reviews I was worried my application would not easily go through. I made sure I had my passport ready to scan. One thing I wasn’t prepared for was taking a selfie on a white background. After submitting I was received instant approval by email. Very quick and efficient.

Underrated App. Ignore the average app rating. The app uses your built in NFC for your passports biometric verification and FaceID so you don’t need to upload any pictures. It is a wonderful app that is designed to be used once in 2 years. Use this instead of any other portal to get your UK visa. We got our decisions in under 90 seconds.

Works just fine. It literally took 5 minutes from start to finish, including receiving the approval email. I don’t understand how so many people are having so much trouble following simple directions. Whatever the problem is, it’s not with the app…

Terrible. This app is unresponsive and takes far longer than it should, that is if it works. I was bumped more than half a dozen times after taking my passport photo, and still have not been able to get it to work. I suggest you save yourself the time and frustration and apply directly online (although I’ve been waiting in a queue for more than 15 minutes now just to enter my information).

Needs Improvement. The scanning of the chip did not work no matter how hard I tried. Had to give up and say that the passport has no chip. Also, does not allow for entering multiple members of the same family with any sharing of information. You have to enter each person completely separately from beginning to end, including payment details. That takes a lot longer than it needs to.

User Friendly. This app is easy to use and step by step instructions when applying for ETA to enter the UK. It took me 10 maybe 15 mins (as i had to take another photo coz i didn’t like the first one) for start to finish. Accepts Apple Pay and google pay as forms of payment.

Worked great. I don’t understand the low ratings. Worked great for me. Took a couple tries to get the photo to stick, and to find the chip in my passport, but the whole process was done in 10 minutes. Other apps charge huge fees - use this one.

NFC SCAN LOCATION. Be advised the NFC chip on new US passports is inside the back cover of the passport and usually near the top. If using an iPhone with NFC chip, the chip is in the top bezel. SO: open the back cover of the passport and scan using the top of the iPhone. When you hit the chip the app will tell you to “stop moving.” You really have to hit this spot on for it to work. The directions to lay the phone on the passport don’t work.

Extremely hard for older generations. I’ve been on the phone with my 60 year old mother explaining what she had to do, for over 1h and currently still trying to help her. Every time you get out of the app the session closes, her bank is only online so it was impossible for her to get her card details to pay because the card doesn’t have any details printed as it is only online where you can get the information. So it would be helpful to make the app stop closing the session every time someone changes apps for less than 30 seconds

Works……eventually. App continually indicates states the chip on the back page of a US passport is isn’t reading, except when you hit skip in order to enter all the information manually, and it goes to the next page, it shows that it did indeed read the chip. So basically you can’t trust what it’s telling you.

Worked Very Well. The entire process took less than 5 minutes. I was ready and had everything needed before I began. And it took Apple pay so the payment was quick and easy. Do scout out a place with good lighting and a light background with no objects, to take your selfie picture.

Got to do it. It was relatively easy, although it is important to have good lighting when you take the picture of your passport and try to have a light or white colored wall behind you when you take your photo. Open your eyes wide or the picture won’t accept.

Quick and easy!. I also wanted to leave a review because of the 3 star rating the app has lol. Super quick and easy to use! Make sure your case is off your phone and on the back page start sliding your phone down to find the chip! Just took a couple times but again, like 5 mins total here! lol

Great app!. Leaving a review because I don’t understand the low rating. Super quick. Super easy. Uses the phone camera to scan your passport, but you don’t scan a picture- it’ll prompt for a selfie. Just know- have to pay by card and Discover not accepted.

About as easy as it could be. I think the low ratings just reflect general annoyance at the requirement and in particular the rather high fee. But the app itself is fine: easy to use, instructions are clear, no bugs encountered at least on iPhone 16. I’d say well done, Home Office!

Skip chip. We had trouble trying to scan chip several times, by the fifth time it gave the option to click ‘skip’ so we did and we got approved 🤷🏼‍♀️if i would have read the reviews prior to our ‘scanning chip’ issue, i guess we wouldn’t have needed to hit the ‘skip’ button and it still approved us and said in an email no requirement to have paper copy because it’s now connected to our passport

Frustrating and infuriating. This was awful. You don’t find out you need to remove the phone case until it’s time to read the chip. It took me 5 minutes to get the case off and then the chip reader didn’t even work. The remaining process was ok. You need to start the instructions with “remove your phone from its case. “ Next it should say, “the chip reader may not work. If it doesn’t, just answer the questions,”

Needs improvement in autofill, but not bad. Overall not terrible but failed to accept autofill for “hide my email” from latest version of iOS. I had to manually go over to settings and copy the created email into the app. The passport chip scanning was next level, as well as the facial scan.

Quick and Easy. We just filled out the applications for each of our family members and were approved within a matter of minutes. It’s easy to follow and incredibly quick.

Chip reading process issue. App worked very well but failed the chip reading step for 2 separate applications. However, was given the option to skip that step after several tries and it looks like the data was captured successfully at some point. This was with USA documents so I assume some differences with the chip used.

Good App. This app is actually very helpful and easy to use! I received my ETA very quickly after completion, as well :) The only difficult part is the scanning of the passport chip. If you have a U.S. passport, the easiest place I found to scan the chip is about 1/2 way to 3/4 of the way down the inside of the back cover page with the barcode at the bottom. Happy Travels!