The numbers, checked
- Apply here and nowhere else
- evisa.gov.vnChecked 2026-08-02
Do you need a visa?
Passports from most of Europe, the UK, Japan, South Korea, Russia and Belarus get 45 days in Vietnam with no visa at all. You just turn up. Thirty-eight countries are on this list, and Switzerland, Poland and the Czech Republic were added recently.
Your passport needs at least two blank pages.
Checked 2026-08-02
If your country is not on that list, or you want to stay longer than 45 days, you need an e-visa.
The e-visa, and what it really costs
| What you get | Official price |
|---|---|
| Single entry, up to 90 days | 25 USD |
| Multiple entry, up to 90 days | 50 USD |
It usually takes about three working days.
Checked 2026-08-02
Read those numbers again, because this is where people lose money. You will see agencies and travel sites charging 70, 80, even 100 dollars for the same document. They are adding their own fee on top of the government's 25 dollars and hoping you do not know.
Apply here and nowhere else
evisa.gov.vn
Saves you: Also thithucdientu.gov.vn. Both are the real government site.
If a site looks glossier than that, has a live chat box, and asks for more than 25 dollars, it is a middleman.
Single or multiple entry? If you do not plan to leave Vietnam during your stay, single entry is fine and saves you 25 dollars. If you want a weekend in Thailand or Laos, pay for multiple.
Filling in the form without getting rejected
- Permanent address is the address in your own country, the one tied to your passport. Contact address is where you will stay in Vietnam. Put your first hotel. It does not have to be where you end up.
- Purpose of entry: choose Tourist.
- The photo: take a plain picture of yourself against a white wall with your phone. Do not use a professional portrait. If the system warns you the photo looks like it came from somewhere else, that warning appears for almost everyone.
- Your arrival date is binding. You cannot enter before it. Your 90 days count from the date on the visa, not the day you land. Put a date three weeks early and you have thrown those days away.
Count days, not months. Ninety days is not the same as three months.
Do you need a return ticket?
Usually nobody asks. When it does come up it is at the airport you are leaving from, at the airline desk, not at Vietnamese immigration.
If you are flying one way and want to be safe, book a fully refundable ticket out and cancel it once you have landed. You do not need proof of onward travel to apply for the visa itself.
When to come
Da Nang has a wet season, roughly late August through November. On paper October is the wettest month. Ask people who live here and many will say November is the one that drags on.
You will find dramatic photographs online of central Vietnam under water. Most of those are Hoi An, not Da Nang. Hoi An sits low on a river and floods properly. Da Nang gets a lot of rain and some low streets take water for a while. Some places close. Most do not. Life carries on.
So do not plan your year around avoiding this. And do not cancel a November trip over a photo of a flooded street in a different town.
Checked 2026-08-02