France unveils how tourists will be welcomed back

Here's what you need to know...

From Wednesday 9th June, there will be a traffic light system that will remove restrictions such as obligatory quarantine for fully vaccinated tourists from non-EU countries including the UK and USA. Travellers from EU countries will also be able to enter without the need for a PCR test.

We will explain everything below, but essentially, it is a combination of your vaccination status and the colour of the country you are travelling from. There will be no entry requirements for fully vaccinated travellers from a green country and only a PCR test needed for vaccinated travellers from an orange country.

French COVID-19 Traffic Light System for Travel

Countries are divided into three tiers and rules imposed for vaccinated and non-vaccinated travellers from each of the three tiers (see map below). The classification of countries may alter, depending on the spread of Covid-19 in each country.

Green - all EU and Schengen zone countries as well as countries where the virus is not circulating widely such as Australia, South Korea, Israel, Japan, New Zealand, Singapore and Lebanon

Orange - Countries are ranked orange if the virus is circulating but being controlled and there is no widespread circulation of variants.

Red - Countries where the virus is circulating widely and there is "a worrying presence of Covid variants". At the moment, these countries are: South Africa, Argentina, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Brazil, Bolivia, Colombia, Costa Rica, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Suriname, Turkey and Uruguay

Travel Rules for Vaccinated and Non-Vaccinated Travellers to France

Each colour tier has different rules for vaccinated and non-vaccinated travellers.

Green

  • Green and fully vaccinated - no extra entry requirements
  • Green and not vaccinated - a negative Covid test (antigen or PCR) taken within the previous 72 hours

Orange

  • Orange and fully vaccinated - a negative Covid test (antigen or PCR) taken within the previous 72 hours of travel to France
  • Orange and not vaccinated - travel allowed for essential reasons only or for certain categories of travellers, people who qualify must present a negative Covid test (antigen or PCR) taken within the previous 72 hours and quarantine for seven days on arrival before taking a second test

Red

  • Red and fully vaccinated - travel allowed for essential reasons only, presentation of a negative Covid test (antigen or PCR) taken within the previous 48 hours and quarantine for seven days on arrival before taking a second test
  • Red and not vaccinated - travel allowed for essential reasons only and only for certain kinds of travellers, presentation of a negative Covid test (antigen or PCR) taken within the previous 48 hours and quarantine for 10 days on arrival. This quarantine will be enforced with police checks on the registered quarantine address.

What does fully vaccinated mean?

To qualify as fully vaccinated, travellers must:

  • Have received a vaccine that is approved by the European Medicines Agency - Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca or Johnson & Johnson (known as Janssen in France)
  • Be at least two weeks after the second injection for double-dose vaccines or for two weeks after a single dose for those people who had previously had Covid-19
  • Be at least four weeks after the injection for people who had the single dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine

We recommend your own government’s travel advisory service information for your destination country: