Using credit cards in Nepal in 2026, where they work and where cash wins

You can use a credit card in Nepal, but only in a narrow slice of the country: a small number of upmarket hotels, the larger trekking agencies and perhaps one or two restaurants per city, and usually with a 3–4% surcharge even there. Everywhere else — the bus stops on the Prithvi Highway, the trekking checkposts and every teahouse on the trail — runs on Nepali rupees in cash. So the card you bring matters less for paying and more for pulling cash out of an ATM cheaply, and the real planning question is where the machines stop.

Where credit cards actually work in Nepal

In practice a card works at a handful of upmarket hotels, the big trekking agencies and one or two restaurants per city, and almost nowhere else. That is what our guides have seen for years in Kathmandu and Pokhara: a card that works in your hotel lobby will not work at the shop across the street, or anywhere once you leave the city.

Three places catch people out: the Prithvi Highway bus stops between Kathmandu and Pokhara, where cards are not accepted and the Mugling ATMs are unreliable; the trekking checkposts, which want rupees; and the teahouses on the Annapurna and Everest trails, which take no cards at all.

The surcharge, and the question you must answer at the machine

Where a card is accepted, expect a 3–4% surcharge added by the merchant, and never agree to be charged in your home currency. You can only avoid the surcharge by paying cash, but you can avoid making it worse.

The way to make it worse is dynamic currency conversion. A terminal or ATM may offer to charge you in dollars, pounds or euros instead of rupees. Say no, every time. Choosing your home currency hands the exchange rate to the merchant’s payment provider rather than your card network, and it is almost always the worse deal. Our guide to paying in local currency at the card machine explains how the markup works. With a card that also charges a foreign transaction fee, one hotel bill can carry three separate charges.

ATMs in Nepal: fees, caps and where the machines stop

A Nepali ATM charges about NPR 500 per withdrawal, and counting your own bank’s fee the total is typically US$3–6 each time, so fewer, larger withdrawals are the cheapest way to get cash. Machines are plentiful in Kathmandu and Pokhara. Most allow a maximum of about NPR 35,000 per transaction, and some Standard Chartered and Nabil Bank machines allow NPR 50,000. In our experience Nabil Bank and Standard Chartered have the most reliable machines.

The fee is per withdrawal, not per rupee, which is why the size of each withdrawal matters. Take out NPR 35,000 in one go and the NPR 500 fee is about 1.4% of what you withdrew. Take out NPR 5,000 seven times and you pay NPR 3,500 in Nepali fees for the same NPR 35,000 — seven times as much, before your own bank adds anything.

What really matters on a trek is where the ATMs end.

Treat Namche as a top-up, not a plan. It is the last cash on any Khumbu route, a single withdrawal there is capped at around NPR 30,000, and machines that far up can run short when the trail is busy. Withdraw what you need in Kathmandu before you fly to Lukla. For the wider picture on fees, read how to stop paying foreign transaction and ATM fees.

Which cards to bring to Nepal

Bring two cards on two different networks — say one Visa and one Mastercard — ideally with no foreign transaction fee, and tell both banks you are going to Nepal. The second card is not about rewards. It is insurance against a fraud block, a swallowed card or a network outage on the one day you need cash.

• A no-foreign-fee card saves you your own bank’s charge on every hotel bill and, with some cards, on withdrawals. We have written separate country guides to the best travel cards for Canada, the UK and Australia, each with the no-foreign-fee options named.
• A debit card or travel money card for the ATM. Taking cash on a credit card usually counts as a cash advance, which on most cards starts charging interest the day you withdraw. A debit card or a travel money account avoids that; check your own card’s terms before you rely on it.
• A travel notice. An unexpected Kathmandu withdrawal is exactly what fraud systems block.

Rewards matter less here than anywhere, because the trail runs on cash. And if you carry a balance from month to month, no rewards card is worth it — the interest outweighs any points. If you are weighing cash against card for a trip generally, the logic in Nepal is simply more extreme.

How much cash to carry for a trek

On an independent teahouse trek, bed and food alone run about US$25–40 a day, so carry enough rupees for every trail day plus a buffer, withdrawn in Kathmandu or Pokhara before you start. That figure excludes permits and guide fees, and costs rise with altitude, above Namche especially.

A worked example. Ten trail days at the top of that range is US$400. At about NPR 134 to the dollar, that is roughly NPR 53,600 — two withdrawals at a 35,000-rupee machine, costing about NPR 1,000 in Nepali fees.

Carry plenty of NPR 100 and NPR 500 notes. Teahouses and stalls often cannot break a NPR 1,000 note, and small notes are what you need for a hot shower, a phone charge, snacks and tips. Split the stash between your daypack, a money belt and your duffel. Our Nepal budget guide has the full daily cost picture.

Paying for the visa on arrival

Pay for your Nepal visa on arrival in US dollar notes: US$30 for 15 days, US$50 for 30 days or US$125 for 90 days. Cards are now accepted at Kathmandu airport, but the card machines and ATMs are unreliable at peak arrival times, and exact cash avoids problems with change. The e-visa lets you pay online by card before you fly, which is the cleaner way to use plastic for this. Our visa on arrival guide walks through the counter step by step.

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Sources: Travel Himalaya Nepal field reporting, from our guides’ experience in Kathmandu, Pokhara and on the trails since 1998, as published in our Nepal travel tips, Kathmandu, Namche Bazaar, Kathmandu–Pokhara, budget and visa-on-arrival guides; card acceptance, surcharges, ATM fees and caps, and ATM locations are our own reporting, not a bank’s published tariff. The cash example is our own arithmetic. This is general information, not financial advice; card offers change, so confirm the current terms with the issuer before you apply. No card issuer pays us for placement on this page.