Thai Royal Gazette

The Thai Royal Gazette (ราชกิจจานุเบกษา) is Thailand's official government gazette, published continuously since 1874 under the authority of the Cabinet Secretariat of the Royal Thai Government. Royal decrees, legislation passed by the National Assembly, cabinet resolutions, ministerial regulations, and administrative orders all gain legal force only upon publication in the Gazette; the document is therefore not a summary of policy but the formal instrument that brings policy into law. Without publication, a cabinet-approved measure has no legal effect on rights, obligations, or procedures. Publication typically follows cabinet approval within days to several weeks for straightforward ministerial notifications, but there is no statutory Deadline.

The Gazette is structured into sections by type of instrument: royal announcements carry the highest constitutional standing; ministerial notifications and departmental circulars appear in lower-precedence sections. For subordinate legislation such as the Interior Ministry announcements required to activate Thailand's May 2026 Visa-free change, publication in the relevant Gazette section followed by a stated commencement interval is the standard mechanism. The three announcements governing the Visa-free cut from 60 to 30 days for most of 93 countries each require individual Gazette publication, after which the measure takes effect 15 days later. As of 23 June 2026, none of the three announcements had been published, meaning the cabinet's 19 May decision remained legally inert and the 60-day Visa-free window was still in force at every land and air border.

The Gazette's role as a legal bottleneck is well understood by Thai practitioners and foreign Visa agents tracking the change; its non-publication has been the operative fact keeping the pre-change rules alive more than a month after cabinet approval. The Cabinet Secretariat publishes Gazette issues online at ratchakitchanubeksa.SOC.go.th, where each issue is searchable by date, volume, and subject. Policy observers monitoring the Visa change can verify commencement by searching for the three Interior Ministry announcements by subject in the Gazette's regulatory section.