Hungary has registered a total of 960,844 COVID-19 cases of infections and 32,171 deaths since the start of the pandemic, based on the official data provided by the World Health Organization (WHO).
- Advertisement -However, despite such figures, authorities in the Central European country have started to ease their preventive measures imposed to halt the further spread of the virus and its new strains, especially for vaccinated travellers and permit them to enter its territory even for tourism purposes.
Following the path of other countries worldwide, authorities in Hungary imposed entry bans and other restrictions, at the very beginning of the COVID-19 outbreak, as part of their efforts to prevent a surge in the number of infections. However, despite the restrictions, there are some general exemptions applied.
According to the European Union official website, citizens who fall under the following categories are not required to follow entry requirements, regardless of their citizenship;
“Travellers fulfilling one of the criteria mentioned above do not need any permission, nor prior PCR tests in order to enter Hungary, they do not need to go into isolation, and their length of stay is not limited,” the statement clarifies.
Earlier this month, the Hungarian Gazette announced that since August 7, travellers from several territories worldwide would be eligible to travel to Hungary, provided that they present a negative result of the PCR test when flying to the country.
The same source revealed that passengers reaching Hungary from the following countries are allowed to enter if they meet the testing requirement:
Other exemptions may be applied for business travellers as well as a few other categories.
Travellers who do not meet the requirements mentioned above must follow special measures imposed by the Hungarian government, taking into account travellers’ citizenship and the purpose of their stay.
Following the recommendation of the European Union, currently, citizens of Hungary are permitted to enter their territory, without entry permission or PCR test result, regardless of the purpose of their stay, if they follow a ten-day mandatory quarantine rule or until they show two negative PCR tests results taken two days apart.
As for non-Hungarian citizens, they are allowed to enter Hungary only for specific cases, based on their purpose of stay.
“The entry of non-Hungarian travellers not falling into the general exemption categories (see above), or the essential and special entry purpose categories (listed below) is currently not allowed. Tourism is considered as a non-essential purpose of entry,” the statement clarifies.
Travellers from other countries can enter Hungary for any of the purposes mentioned below if they hold an entry permit issued by the Hungarian Police without being obliged to present a COVID-19 PCR test result:
However, travellers allowed to enter must stay self-isolated for ten days upon their arrival in the Central European country. Still, the quarantine period can be shortened by performing two PCR tests in Hungary.
Hungary introduced the COVID EU Vaccine Passport on June 30 to ease the travel process for vaccinated passengers, even though it foresaw that such a certificate would be ready by June 15.
The European Commission allowed EU Member States to launch such documents for travellers who have been vaccinated against the virus with any of the vaccines approved by the European Medicines Agency (EMA). Still, each Member State can decide if they want to permit the entry of passengers vaccinated with vaccines that EMA does not approve.
At present, the vaccines recognized by EMA are Comirnaty (BioNTech, Pfizer), Janssen (Johnson & Johnson), and Moderna, Vaxzevria ( AstraZeneca, Oxford).
Whereas the vaccines approved by Hungary are Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, AstraZeneca, Sputnik V, Sinopharm (Beijing), Sinovac (CoronaVac), CanSinoBio, Janssen, and CoviShield.
However, Hungary and Russia are currently discussing the possibility of licensing production of Russia’s Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine in Hungary, which could start from the end of 2022, according to the country’s Foreign Minister, Peter Szijjarto, as Reuters reported.
In addition, authorities in Hungary have also announced that all persons vaccinated against the virus with any of the vaccines approved by WHO will also be exempted from additional requirements such as testing or quarantine upon their arrival in Hungary.
At present, the following vaccines are approved by the World Health Organization:
Travellers who have completed their immunization process against the Coronavirus and hold an immunity certificate issued by one of the following countries would be permitted to enter Hungary without being subject to additional requirements: Andorra, Albania, Bahrain, Croatia, Czechia, Cyprus, Faroe Isl., India, Georgia, Israel, Kazakhstan.
Those who have been vaccinated against the virus and hold a valid proof of their vaccination issued by the following countries, will also be permitted to enter Hungary; Kyrgyzstan, Moldova Monaco, Montenegro, Mongolia, North Macedonia, Morocco, Panama, Russia, Romania, San Marino, Serbia, Slovenia, Slovakia, Switzerland, Ukraine, Turkey, Uzbekistan or Vatican City (Holy See) as well as minors under age 18.
Passengers are strongly encouraged to purchase travel insurance to help them save their money, especially amid the ongoing pandemic, if the trip gets cancelled or delayed due to the COVID-19 situation or other purposes.
At the same time, travellers are very likely to experience unforeseen medical emergencies due to the spread of the virus or even accidents and other health issues. Being covered with health insurance while travelling to Hungary means receiving the right care while spending very little money.
Hungary’s travel insurance measures can be purchased from or Europ Assistance.
As the country is currently highly affected by the spread of the Coronavirus, there is not much that travellers can currently do.
“Indoor sport and cultural events or outdoor events with over 500 people can only be attended by people with immunity certificates. People under 18 can only attend these events with an immunity certificate or being accompanied by a person with an immunity card,” the statement published by Wego Travel Blog reads.
Even though the epidemiological situation in the country this summer was considered relatively stable, the delta variant’s rapid spread led to an upsurge in the number of infections lately; therefore, the Hungarian Medical Chamber (MOK) issued a new statement calling on citizens to be more careful.
In order to increase the vaccination rate and prevent another upsurge in the number of COVID-19 infections, authorities in the Central European country announced that they would take a vaccination action week between 22-28 November.
“Unvaccinated people can exceptionally arrive at the vaccination points without prior registration. In this case, they will be registered on-site and vaccinated on a first-come-first-served basis. For those who have previously registered online it is still recommended to make an appointment, whether they want to take the first or missed second or third vaccination,” the statement published by the University of Dunaújváro.
As the COVID-19 cases started to increase again, authorities in Hungary decided to take other preventive measures. The Head of the Prime Minister’s Office, Gergely Gulyás, stressed that the following three measures became effective at the beginning of this month.
According to the figures published by the World Health Organization, a total of 345 new COVID-19 infection cases were recorded in Hungary in the past 24 hours, while three patients died due to the virus.
Whereas data by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control shows that Hungary has so far vaccinated 64.9 per cent of the population.
NOTE: This article was originally published on September 9. Since then, the same has been continuously updated with the most recent changes. The last changes to the article were made on November 17, in line with the most recent updates of the Hungarian authorities.
