Getting a visa for the UAE differs depending on your nationality, as per any other country. We refer only to tourist visas. There are three categories:
No Visa required for entry to Dubai, Abu Dhabi and all other Emirates in the UAE
If you are from the GCC (Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar), you do not require a visa to enter the UAE, whether you are entering by air, land or sea. You just require your passport.
Visa received on entry to Dubai, Abu Dhabi and all other Emirates in the UAE
This category of nationality will just receive their visa on entry to the UAE. The countries are: United States, Canada, UK (and those with the right of abode in UK), Australia, New Zealand, France, Italy, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Austria, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Portugal, Ireland, Greece, Finland, Spain, Monaco, Vatican, Iceland, Andorra, San Marino, Liechtenstein, Japan, Brunei, Singapore, Malaysia, South Korea, holders of Hong Kong SAR passports. It’s free to receive a visa and you will receive a visa allowing you to stay for 30 days. That’s more than enough for most, though you may wish to renew for another 60 days, of you are scoping out the UAE for business purposes. You should speak to a specialist in this case. You’ll need sponsorship and things of this nature. However, if you are coming in for a few days on business, you can just get a 30 day business visa on arrival which essentially is the same as this tourist visa
If you don’t fall into the two above categories, i.e. you can’t automatically receive a visa or you don’t need a visa, you will require sponsorship for tourism purposes. There are two main ways to undertake this: sponsorship by a UAE resident (who could be family or even a friend), or sponsorship by the hotel where you are staying. You will need to get your sponsor to arrange all the paperwork in the UAE before your arrival – at least a few weeks to be sure. They will need all your details from when you are arriving to leaving. If you are staying in a hotel, you will need to stay with them for the duration of the trip and they will hold your passport for that time.
If you have an Israeli stamp in your passport, you may find it difficult to get into the UAE. The best way around this is to get a second passport created.
For more information, go to http://www.government.ae or contact your UAE embassy in your country. Don't overstay your visa period, as you will be charged a fee per day!