Turkish Student Visa for Afghans: Documents and Costs (2026)

If you hold an Afghan passport and a Turkish university has accepted you, the education visa is the step that decides whether you start this year. It is also the step where most of the misinformation sits: agents who claim special access, old fee tables, and advice written for other nationalities. This guide gives you the real process and the real fees, the costs you will meet after you land, and the whole first year in one budget.

Where Afghan students apply

In Afghanistan, you do not hand your file to the embassy. Sefa Visa Travel & Tours Agency is the only authorised centre for Turkish visa applications in the country, with offices in four cities:

• Kabul
• Mazar-i-Sharif
• Herat
• Kandahar

No other agency, company or person is authorised to take applications or act as a go-between, and the centre’s only website is sefavisa.com. Booking an appointment there is free. Nobody can sell you an appointment, move yours forward for a fee, or promise a faster decision, and anyone who offers to is not working for the centre.

If you live in Iran or Pakistan

Many Afghan students live in Iran or Pakistan, not Afghanistan. If you live there legally, you apply at the Turkish mission in that country, not in Afghanistan: in Iran through the Turkish Embassy in Tehran’s online pre-application, in Pakistan through the Turkish Embassy in Islamabad. Bring your valid residence card along with the same documents listed below. That mission sets its own fee. We prepare these files every intake and tell you exactly what your mission will ask for.

Who can apply for an education visa

The education visa is open to undergraduate and graduate students: bachelor’s, master’s and PhD applicants with a place at a Turkish university. You apply after you have the university’s acceptance letter, not before. A conditional offer that still waits on documents or a deposit is not enough; the letter must come from the Turkish university itself.

The documents you need

There are two sets: documents every applicant brings, and the ones specific to the education visa.

A few of these deserve more than a line.

The bank statement. It must come from the issuing bank itself, not a printout you made or a letter from a third party. There is no fixed minimum balance; the statement is how the officer judges whether you can pay for your studies. Tuition plus a year of living costs is a sensible target, and a sudden large deposit just before you apply looks worse than a steady balance.

The attested diploma. Bring the original with the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs attestation, not only a copy. Universities will ask for the same attested documents at registration, so doing this once, properly, saves you a second round later.

The medical tests. HIV, hepatitis and tuberculosis results are required for this category. Use a recognised laboratory, keep the original reports, and do the tests close enough to your appointment that they are recent.

The passport. It must be valid for at least 8 months from the day you enter Türkiye; if it has less left, renew it before you apply. Every traveller, children included, needs a separate application.

What the visa costs

The fees are set in US dollars:

Nobody may charge you anything beyond these fees, and the fee is not refunded if the visa is refused. Budget separately for the costs around the visa: the medical tests, translations if a document is not in English or Turkish, the Foreign Ministry attestation, photos, and travel to the nearest of the four centres if you do not live in one of those cities.

The order that works

Timing is where Afghan applicants lose the most ground. The acceptance letter and attestation each take weeks, the visa decision usually takes 7 to 30 working days and sometimes longer, and visa centres are busiest in the summer before the autumn intake. Students who start the university application five or six months before term are the ones who arrive for registration week. If your letter arrives late, ask the university whether you can defer to the spring semester rather than arriving after classes start.

If the visa is refused

Only the Turkish embassy or consulate decides on a visa. Sefa Visa takes your file and sends it on, and its staff have no influence on the result, for better or worse. The fee is not refunded if the visa is refused, because it pays for processing the file. You can apply again, though: before you do, fix whatever the previous refusal pointed to.

After you land: the residence permit

The visa lets you in for up to 90 days. To stay for your degree you need a student residence permit (ikamet), which you apply for online through the immigration authority after you register at your university, inside those 90 days. Your university’s international office usually guides you through it.

The good news is the cost. Students enrolled at Turkish universities are exempt from the residence permit fee itself. You still pay for the physical card, which is 964 Turkish lira in 2026, about $20. You also need health insurance for the whole period of the permit, and here you have two options:

• The public scheme (GSS). International students can join Türkiye’s general health insurance. The premium is tied to the minimum wage and comes to about 16,000 lira a year in 2026, roughly $320. You must apply within three months of your first registration, or you lose the right to it.
• A private policy. Insurers sell residence-permit health policies that meet the official minimum cover. Basic student plans are often a few hundred dollars a year, and prices vary by age and insurer, so get a quote before you choose.

Tuition: what Afghan students actually pay

Visa and permit costs are small next to tuition, and tuition depends almost entirely on your subject. From the 687 English-taught bachelor’s programmes in our catalogue at mainland Turkish universities, priced per year in US dollars (October 2026, list prices before any cash discount):

Half of all English-taught bachelor’s programmes cost between $4,000 and $8,000 a year. Some universities also take 5 to 15 percent off for paying the year in one go, and some offer merit discounts on top. Use the programme explorer to see the current fee for the exact programme you want, and our guide to tuition discounts for how the reductions work.

Getting there and living there

The flight. Kam Air, Ariana and Turkish Airlines fly direct from Kabul to Istanbul. In autumn 2026, one-way fares on the cheaper carriers started at about $380 to $420, and Turkish Airlines round trips at about $720 to $900. Fares move with the season, so check before you book.

Living costs. Rent, food and transport for a student come to about $400 to $700 a month, lower in Ankara and smaller cities and higher in central Istanbul. Our guide to the cost of living in Istanbul, Ankara and Cyprus breaks this down by city.

A realistic first-year budget

Here is what a first year costs an Afghan student on a typical English-taught bachelor’s programme (not medicine or dentistry):

The medical tests, document attestation, translations and the university deposit come on top, and their cost depends on where you do them. For medicine or dentistry, replace the tuition line with the figures in the table above. For the full picture beyond the first year, see the total cost of studying in Türkiye.

To see this guide’s dollar figures in afghani, use the converter below.

Mistakes that cost Afghan students a semester

How we help Afghan students

Türkiye Apply works with Afghan families every intake, and the visa file is where our checking matters most. We help you choose a programme and university that fits your budget, get the official acceptance letter, prepare a document file that matches the embassy’s list, and plan the timing so you arrive for registration. After you land, we guide you through registration, insurance and the residence permit. Our consultation is free, and we will tell you plainly if your file needs more work before you apply.

Read our broader guide for Afghan students in Türkiye, or the general Turkish student visa guide if you are applying from another country.

Frequently asked questions