The 14 Most Beautiful Towns and Cities in Vietnam

Hội An is a Unesco World Heritage Site and one of Vietnam’s most important tourist destinations. With wonderful cuisine, intriguing history, and irresistible charm, Hội An is one of the Vietnamese cities that best matches many travellers’ ideas of what Vietnam is like. A major port between the 16th and 18th centuries, it owes its beauty to a combination of Asian and European influences. Small enough to explore on foot, Hội An’s streets are dotted with Chinese temples, lively food markets and wooden-fronted shophouses. Galleries selling local artwork and laid-back open-air cafes add a charming, bohemian element. There is also an annual lantern festival, which takes place along the Hoai River.

Once a sleepy fishing village, Mũi Né is now a favourite weekend getaway destination for immigrants living the Vietnam urban life in nearby Ho Chi Minh City, known previously as Saigon. Despite its increasing popularity with tourists, the town retains an invitingly low-key atmosphere. Its nine-mile beach is lined with low-rise resorts, restaurants and shops. The bay is a well-known hot spot for wind and kite surfing, thanks to wind levels that are relatively consistent throughout the year. If you need a break from the beach, take a tour of the surrounding sand dunes. These dunes actually help create the town’s pleasant microclimate, causing rainfall to be relatively minimal even during the country’s wet season.

At an altitude of 1.5km (about a mile) above sea level, Đà Lạt offers year-round cool weather and serene mountain scenery. This quaint city was once a favourite retreat of Vietnamese emperors and French colonials eager to escape the country’s summer heat. The European influences are still noticeable in the French colonial architecture found in the city’s central area, where the streets are lined with red-roofed stone buildings. With lovely churches, markets, winding streets and colourful gardens, the city is a wonderful place for strolling. The surrounding area offers lakes, forests and waterfalls – perfect for trekking, biking and rock-climbing.

Nha Trang is a city in Vietnam that’s home to some of the country’s top beaches and dive sites. The city’s 6km (4mi) crescent-shaped beach is set against a picturesque mountain backdrop. Aside from soft sands, the shoreline offers a pleasant promenade, sculpture parks, and scenic gardens. Dozens of local companies offer day-trips to the more than 20 islands found just off the coast, where you can enjoy hiking and snorkelling. Towards the centre of the city, you’ll find some fantastic restaurants as well as the Po Nagar Cham Temple, which dates back to the eighth century.

The largest city in the Mekong Delta, Cần Thơ sits at the meeting point of several different waterways. It’s an ideal base for visiting the nearby floating markets, with canals and rivers filled with an astonishing variety of boats and ships. Cần Thơ’s lovely riverfront is lined with sculpture gardens and some of the region’s best restaurants. The backstreets give rise to a few unique temples and a buzzing night market, plus a short trip outside of the city will bring you to beautiful countryside landscapes covered with rice fields.

Located 120km (75mi) south of Ho Chi Minh City, Vũng Tàu is a popular beach destination for locals and expats looking to escape the city. Set in a gorgeous location on a peninsula, with ocean on three sides, the city is pleasantly scruffy with wide boulevards and grand colonial-era buildings. The boardwalk along Bai Sau, also known as Back Beach, is lined with seafood restaurants and shops. The city has a fairly large population of Christians, accounting for the statue of Jesus set towards the north, a smaller version of Rio de Janeiro’s Christ the Redeemer.

Set at a meeting point of a tributary linking the Bassac and Mekong rivers, Châu Đốc is the closest city to the Vietnamese-Cambodian border crossing. Locals are known for being especially friendly, with the city’s pastel-coloured shop fronts adding to its already-cheerful ambiance. With large Khmer, Cham and Chinese communities, the city is also interesting from a cultural perspective. Check out the vibrant main market and then wander along the pretty waterfront promenade nearby. Take the ferry across the river to visit Chau Doc’s largest mosque.

A popular day-trip from Sapa, Bắc Hà also serves as a more low-key base for exploring the country’s northern highlands and hill tribe villages. Set at 1.2km (nearly a mile) above sea level, the town is fringed by cone-shaped mountains. This quiet town comes to life on Sundays when ethnic-minority villagers such as the Dao, Flower Hmong, Tay, Nung and Giay people come to the town for its bustling market. Everything from textiles and handbags to livestock is traded. On many market days, Flower Hmong singers perform captivating songs to entertain market-goers.

Another Unesco World Heritage Site, Huế was Vietnam’s Imperial City and later the capital of the country’s Nguyen emperors. The town was devastated by wars with the French and the Americans in the 19th and 20th centuries, it’s still filled with enthralling tombs, temples, and palaces. The Perfume River (Sông Hương) winds through the city, with the Forbidden City looming over its north bank. Dating back to the early 19th century, this citadel stretches for three miles along the town’s waterfront. The Perfume River itself is dotted with houseboats, long-tail vessels and dragon boats.

Phu Quoc Island is one of the best places to visit in Vietnam because of its spectacular beaches. Dương Đông, the big town on the island, is a picturesque fishing village with vibrant markets and a turquoise fleet of boats moored all along the river and offshore. For seafood lovers, there’s a street lined with stacks of tanks all filled with live catch for you to choose from. Take at least one night of your time on Phu Quoc and wander around town. Like many experiences in Vietnam, the best ones are spontaneous, found by chance as you stroll through different communities. Recommended by Matthew Pike.

Some people are put off by the flagrant exploitation which is morphing Ha Long Bay from a natural wonder into a monument of human greed and the shortsightedness inherent to our age. To get away from hoards of tour buses, go north to Cẩm Phả and Bai Tu Long Bay. It has all the same limestone giants poking their rocky fingers out of the calm waters, but without all the monstrous resorts of Ha Long City. You can also get junk boats out of Ha Long Bay to visit Bai Tu Long Bay. Either way, it’s an interesting alternative. Recommended by Matthew Pike.

In southeast Vietnam, where the country bulges out into the South China Sea, most tourists make stops in Nha Trang, Phan Thiết and Mũi Né. They overlook Ninh Hòa, which is home to a 10 kilometer (six mile) stretch of white-sand beach where you won’t see too many foreigners. It’s a lovely town, an hour north of Nha Trang. You get to see what a Vietnamese beach town looks like without all the touristy shops catering to rich foreigners — a nice break from the predictable backpacker haunts. Recommended by Matthew Pike.

The Côn Đảo Islands are an archipelago off the coast of southern Vietnam known for turtles, beaches and scuba diving. They’re not on the usual traveling circuit because they’re a bit out of the way. You really do need a few days to properly enjoy them. Before exploring the wonderful, unblemished scenes around the different islands, check out Côn Sơn Town on Côn Sơn, the largest island. Recommended by Matthew Pike.

As you finish your descent over the Hai Van Pass, north of Da Nang, you come around one last corner and find one of the most beautiful sights in all of Vietnam. It’s a famous scene from an episode of Top Gear, and if you’re traveling along the coast in either direction, then add some time to have a look at Lăng Cô. Recommended by Matthew Pike.

“That image really is a metaphor for Vietnam — the mountains, the coastline, the big new engineering project and the traditional fishing scene…” — Jeremy Clarkson, from Top Gear, Season 12: Episode 8