B1 B2 Visa Itinerary Example for Tourist

Nobody hands you an official itinerary form when you apply for a B1/B2 visa. There's no box on the DS-160 that says "attach your plan here," and no rule in the regulations spelling out how many cities you're allowed to visit. But ask anyone who's sat through the interview and they'll tell you the same thing: you need to be able to say where you're going, when you're arriving, when you're leaving, and where you're sleeping. Writing it down first makes that a whole lot easier.

So here's what that document actually looks like, filled in. Two complete examples, the format they follow, and the part that trips people up — the itinerary you bring to the interview isn't quite the same as the one you show at the airport.

What a B1/B2 travel itinerary actually needs to contain

Five things, and no more than that:

• Your arrival date and your departure date
• The cities you'll visit, in the order you'll visit them
• How many nights you're spending in each city
• Where you're staying each night (hotel name and city, or your host's address)
• Roughly what you'll do each day

That's it. Notice what's missing: a minute-by-minute schedule, restaurant reservations, ticket confirmations. The itinerary isn't there to prove you're a keen tourist. It's there to show that the trip is real, that you've thought about it, and that it lines up with everything else in your application.

One practical note if you're travelling with a baby or a toddler: slow the pace down and let the itinerary show it. One main activity a day, longer gaps on travel days. A plan that has you doing three museums a day with a two-year-old reads as something you copied off the internet, not something you're actually going to do.

A two-week US tourist itinerary example, city by city

This shape is a common one — two weeks, six cities, flying home from the west coast. It's the kind of plan applicants share on visa forums, and it works because the day counts are realistic rather than greedy.

Arrive New York 5 May, fly home from Las Vegas 19 May. Fifteen days, fourteen nights.

Add up the days and you get 4 + 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 + 3 = 15. The nights you actually sleep somewhere come to 14. Both numbers should appear in your document somewhere, because an officer is going to want to know how long you're staying without having to count rows.

In a real document, each city block usually gets broken out into individual days — one row per date, same four columns. That's the version to hand over if someone asks to see it.

A short single-city itinerary example for a one-week trip

Not every trip is a six-city tour, and a one-week stay in one place is just as believable. Here's a week in Chicago, staying at one hotel the whole time.

Arrive 10 June, depart 16 June. Seven days, six nights.

Same four columns, same idea. Fewer cities doesn't mean a weaker itinerary. If Chicago is genuinely where you're going, a week there is a truer document than a made-up tour of the whole country.

The right format: date, activity plan, contact, accommodation — and what goes in each column

Four columns. That's the layout used in sample itinerary documents, and it's worth sticking to because it's easy for an officer to scan in a few seconds.

Date. The actual calendar date, and the day of the week if you like. Include your arrival day and your departure day as separate rows.

Activity plan. What you're doing that day, in plain words. Travel days count — write "train to Washington DC" and mean it. Don't list every landmark in the state; two or three things is plenty.

Contact. A phone number someone could actually ring. Your hotel's front desk works. So does your host's number, or a mobile number you'll use while you're in the US. This column exists so the document is anchored to a real person or place, not just an idea.

Accommodation. Where you're sleeping that night, with the city. Hotel name and address, or "staying with [host name], [address]." Repeat it on every row. It looks repetitive, but that's the point — an officer scanning the column can see at a glance that you're never somewhere you can't account for.

Two pages maximum. A Word document or a PDF is fine. There's no official form to fill in, so don't go looking for one.

Tentative vs confirmed plans: what to bring to the interview and what to show at the port of entry

These are two different moments, and mixing them up is where people get nervous.

At the visa interview, nothing needs to be booked. The guidance given to applicants is simply to know your arrival and departure dates, where you're staying, how long for, and what you'll do. A tentative itinerary that's specific — real dates, real cities, a plausible pace — does that job. Don't claim you've paid for things you haven't. If you've booked a refundable hotel room just to have an address to write down, that's fine, as long as it's the address you'd actually use.

At the port of entry, a tentative plan can support a longer visitor stay. If you're asking a border officer for more time than your return ticket suggests, being able to show a written plan for the extra weeks helps explain what you're doing with them.

In both places, the numbers need to be the same numbers. A 15-day plan at the interview and a three-month story at the airport is the kind of inconsistency that turns a routine question into a long one.

Matching your route to your story (tourist vs visiting family or a host)

Your route should match the reason for your trip, and the reason is already in your application. If you ticked "tourism" and named a main destination city, it makes sense for the itinerary to start there. If you're visiting family, it makes sense to arrive near the host.

Concretely: if your DS-160 says you're staying with your sister in New Jersey, your itinerary shouldn't open with five days in Miami before you get to her. And if you wrote "tourism" but your whole itinerary is sitting in your cousin's living room for three weeks, an officer will ask which one it actually is.

Pick one story and let the route follow it.

How to talk through your itinerary when asked at the interview: arrival, departure, where you're staying, how long

You don't need to recite the table. Four things, in this order:

• "I arrive on 5 May."
• "I fly home on 19 May."
• "I'm staying in hotels in New York, Washington, Orlando, San Francisco, LA and Las Vegas." (Or: "I'm staying with my daughter in New Jersey.")
• "Two weeks in total."

Then stop. If they want more, they'll ask — and you can talk about the Statue of Liberty or the space centre without scrambling, because you already wrote it down.

Short answers sound confident. A long recital of every column sounds rehearsed.

Common itinerary mistakes: packing in too many cities, vague 'sightseeing' entries, and details that don't match the DS-160

Too many cities for the days you have. Six cities in ten days, with flights between each one, doesn't look ambitious — it looks padded. If the plan would exhaust you, cut a city and give the rest more nights.

"Sightseeing" as an entry. It tells the reader nothing. "Golden Gate Bridge and Fisherman's Wharf" takes two extra seconds to type and reads like a real trip.

Details that don't match your DS-160. Dates, length of stay, accommodation, who's paying — all of it should agree with what you already submitted. Check them side by side before the interview.

Someone else's template. Names, hotels and dates from a document you copied off a forum are easy to spot and awkward to explain.

A plan nobody could keep. Back-to-back flights, no rest days, a different hotel every night. Real trips have gaps in them.

None of this guarantees approval — nothing does, and anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something. What a clean itinerary does is remove one easy reason for doubt.

Questions people ask before they hit send

How do I write a travel itinerary for a visa application?

Put it in a simple table with four columns: date, activity plan, contact, accommodation. Run through it night by night, city by city. Keep it specific enough to be believable — real dates, real hotel or host details, a realistic pace.

Is there a recommended itinerary for a US visa application?

No. There's no fixed route anyone expects you to follow. Applicants turn up with everything from a 15-day, six-city trip to a single-city stay, and the general guidance is just to make the itinerary detailed and consistent with the trip you described. What matters is that the route, dates and accommodation line up with the rest of your application.

Can you give me an example of a tour itinerary?

The two-week shape above is a common one — a handful of cities with two to four nights each. Shorter single-city plans work just as well if that's the trip you're actually taking.

How do I start writing mine?

Start with your arrival and departure dates. Block out nights per city, add where you're staying, then fill in roughly what you'll do each day. A tourist route can begin in the main destination city; a family visit can start near the host you're staying with.

Take the four-column layout above, drop your own dates, cities and hotel names into it, and give it a read against your DS-160. If every date, city and address matches what's on the form, you've got the document you need.