How Much Does It Cost to Ship a Pet from the USA to Colombia?
Colombia is straightforward on paper and has one step that sits outside the veterinary sequence entirely, and it happens before the animal leaves. You have to be registered with the agricultural authority as a user of its online system in order to get the inspection certificate, and that registration is not something you can do at the airport in Bogota on arrival. There is no rabies antibody test and no quarantine for a pet coming from the United States. Freight on this lane is quoted per booking, so this page prices everything except the flight. Figures verified September 2026.
Airline freight, and why the crate decides it
Airlines price live animals on chargeable weight: whichever is greater, the actual weight or a volume figure worked out from the crate. For pets the volume figure almost always wins, which is why crate size drives the flight cost more than the animal does. The volumetric divisor is the industry standard 166 cubic inches per pound.
No carrier publishes a live animal tariff for the Colombia lane, so freight is priced per booking once the crate size and the dates are known. We will not print a number we cannot source. For scale, published long-haul lanes carry minimums of $690 to $720 plus a $150 processing fee, and a large crate frequently bills at 60 to 70 kilograms of chargeable weight.
Our cost estimator shows how the other lines add up while freight is quoted. Bogota is the usual arrival point and Colombia will clear a pet at any airport, port or land crossing that has an office of the agricultural institute, which is a wider list than most countries offer.
Whichever carrier takes the booking sets its own hold conditions, crate rules and pet charges, and those vary more between airlines than the fares do. Our list of the airlines that carry pets internationally covers which carriers accept live animals out of the US, and our comparison of US airline pet policies puts the big carriers side by side. The freight mechanics on this page come from American Airlines Cargo, whose conditions are set out in full in our guide to the American Airlines pet policy.
The rest of the bill
| Cost | Amount | Who charges it |
|---|---|---|
| Airline freight | Quoted per booking on this lane | Airline |
| USDA export endorsement | $101 per certificate | USDA APHIS |
| IATA crate | $65 to $378 depending on size | Retailer |
| Rabies vaccination | Set by your clinic | Your vet |
| Internal and external parasite treatment | Set by your clinic | Your vet |
| Airline live animal processing | $150 per air waybill | Airline |
| Sanitary inspection certificate | Applied for through the ICA online system | ICA |
| Import permit | None beyond the inspection certificate | Not applicable |
| Rabies antibody test | Not required for entry | Not applicable |
| Quarantine | Only where rabies vaccine is unavailable in the origin country | Not applicable from the USA |
The endorsement sits in the $101 band because no test result has to be verified on the certificate. Colombia requires the health certificate to be issued or endorsed by the official health authority of the country the animal leaves, which on a US move means USDA APHIS. The fee is per certificate rather than per pet.
Register with ICA before you fly, not after you land
Colombia requires you to be registered as a user of ICA, the Instituto Colombiano Agropecuario, through its online system in order to obtain the Certificado de Inspeccion Sanitaria that clears the animal on arrival. It is a pre-arrival step, it is administrative rather than expensive, and it is the single most common thing people discover too late on this route.
Two other Colombian details worth knowing. The minimum age for entry is 15 weeks, so a young puppy cannot simply be brought forward to suit a flight. And Colombia allows up to 10 animals of the same species on a single request, double the European limit of five, which makes it one of the easier destinations for a household moving with several pets.
The certificate clock counts to arrival, not to signature
This is a small difference in wording with a real effect on planning. Most countries measure the certificate window from the day it is issued. Colombia measures it to the day the animal arrives: the health certificate must have been issued no more than 10 calendar days before entry.
So a delayed flight eats the certificate directly rather than eating a separate margin, and on this route the endorsement should be timed as late as the endorsement office allows rather than as early as your vet can manage. The parasite treatment is the opposite: internal and external treatment within 60 days before travel, which is the most relaxed window on this calculator and rarely constrains anything. A first rabies vaccination has to be at least 21 days old on the date of shipment.
What is not included here
Your vet sets their own fees. The examination, the parasite treatment and the certificate paperwork are priced by your clinic and vary between practices, so ask your vet directly. Ground transport at either end is quoted per route. Our coordination fee is included in the total we quote you and itemized on your invoice.
ICA does not publish a flat figure for the inspection certificate that we can quote in advance, so it appears on your invoice at cost rather than as an estimate here.
What moves the price
Crate size is the single biggest lever, because it drives chargeable weight, and on a quoted lane it is the number the carrier prices from. After that it is the arrival airport, since a Medellin or Cali arrival may add a domestic leg depending on which carrier will take the crate. Season matters at the US end rather than the Colombian one: summer heat embargoes narrow the booking window from May, while Bogota sits at altitude and is temperate year round. Two pets on one certificate share the USDA endorsement, while each extra pet adds its own crate and freight, up to 10 animals of the same species on one request.
Figures and sources
Colombian requirements from the Instituto Colombiano Agropecuario page on the entry of dogs and cats, which sits under Resolution 100164 of 2021. Endorsement fees from the USDA APHIS Veterinary Services user fee schedule. Freight mechanics from the American Airlines Cargo live animal pages. Government requirements change, so every figure here is tied to the authority that publishes it. Verified September 2026.
Want this priced for your pet and dates?
Send us the route, the breed and roughly when you want to travel. Request a quote and we will reply with an itemized plan, a timeline and clear next steps. For entry rules and the full paperwork timeline, see our guide to pet shipping requirements for Colombia, or compare other routes on the pet shipping cost calculator.
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