But the journey ahead is not simply a race for the number of visitors, the new challenge is growth by quality.
Breakthrough from historical milestones
Bob Hyland, an American tourist, has visited Vietnam at least 7 times in the past 4 years. Every time he returns, Bob feels surprised by new experiences.
Vietnam is a beautiful country, where people are friendly, cuisine is attractive, culture is rich in identity and there is always more to explore after each return," Bob shared during a trip to Hanoi at the end of December 2025.
Bob's feeling is not an isolated case. The appearance of Vietnamese tourism in 2025 is quite clearly reflected through strong breakthroughs in both scale and quality.
In a year of important events, for the first time the tourism industry reached 21.2 million international visitors, 135.5 million domestic visitors, and total revenue from tourism officially exceeded 1 million billion VND for the first time. Thus, from the milestone of 10 million international visitors in 2016 to more than 20 million visitors in 2025, the market size has doubled in less than 10 years.
Not only setting a domestic record, Vietnam tourism in 2025 also became a bright spot on the global tourism map when the number of international visitors increased by about 22%, many times higher than the world average growth rate of 5%. Compared to the period before the pandemic, the recovery rate reached about 110%, far exceeding the average of 90% of the Asia-Pacific region.
This is not simply a record in scale, but also a milestone showing the real resurgence of Vietnamese tourism after a period of prolonged global volatility. The continuous establishment of new records, both in the international and domestic markets, reflects a deep recovery process, not temporary, supported by the policy foundation and increasingly complete operating capacity of the entire industry.
Visa policies are increasingly open, international aviation connectivity networks are expanded, along with investment in infrastructure and tourism services, creating favorable conditions for tourist flows to return strongly.
Promotion and advertising activities are renewed in a more professional direction, more in line with the target market and associated with building a destination brand. Meanwhile, the tourism product system is gradually exploiting more deeply the cultural values, heritage and local experiences.
Director of the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism - Nguyen Trung Khanh commented: "The achievements are the result of close coordination and active participation of ministries, sectors, localities and the business community, making important contributions to the common success of the country.
Tourism is truly a bright spot in the socio-economic picture in 2025, creating a premise for 2026 to reach higher goals. In 2026, the tourism industry continues to be expected to become a pillar contributing to double-digit GDP growth, requiring the entire industry to make even higher and more drastic efforts to successfully complete the assigned tasks.
Continuing the journey of sublimation
The success of 2025 is not only the destination but also a solid hinge for a new era, when tourism completely surpasses all records of 2019 - the golden age before the pandemic.
Stepping into 2026, the tourism industry sets ambitious goals: Welcoming 25 million international visitors, serving 150 million domestic visitors and bringing total revenue to 1,125 trillion VND.
New milestones naturally bring with them many challenges in terms of infrastructure, environment, service quality and competitiveness. However, clearly identifying these limitations right in the period of strong growth is the premise for Vietnamese tourism to enter 2026 with a more proactive mindset.
According to Dr. Pham Ha - Chairman of LUX Group, to achieve the target of 1,125 trillion VND by 2026, Vietnamese tourism must shift its axis. When there are no more boosts from round and even years, the tourism industry will have to operate on its own with internal capacity.
2026 needs to be identified as a pivotal year to prove that tourism can grow by quality, based on 4 main drivers: Experience, high spending segment, cultural tourism and connecting journey.
The first focus is to develop experiences instead of chasing quantity, towards groups of tourists who tend to stay for long days and spend heavily. Next, focusing on the high-spending segment is considered an effective lever, because just increasing a small percentage of high-end customers can create a significant impact on revenue and employment.
Another pillar is the development of cultural and creative tourism, thereby reducing dependence on seasonality, while enhancing added value for destinations. Tourism development thinking also needs to be expanded in the direction of building journeys connecting many destinations, many industries and services in the same chain of experiences, instead of exploiting each location individually.
In which, cultural tourism is identified as a pillar of Vietnam's cultural industry. But according to Dr. Pham Ha, to go far, businesses must fundamentally change their product-making thinking.
We cannot just "sell heritage". Businesses need to shift from thinking of selling resources to designing value," the expert suggested.
Each dish, each craft village, each sightseeing program or tour needs to be built synchronously, with a clear story, stable service quality and enough emotional experience. When culture is organized and exploited properly - according to Mr. Ha - cultural tourism not only generates immediate revenue but also forms sustainable jobs, nurtures professional pride and promotes the long-term participation of the local community.
From that perspective, this expert places high expectations on the role of reality shows, international music festivals and cinema in attracting tourists in the coming years, especially in 2026.
However, he emphasized that these products should not be implemented in a movement style or just to create a short-term effect. A show or a movie needs to be seen as a long-term asset of the destination, capable of creating a return of visitors, maintaining stable jobs and contributing to raising the brand of tourism.
Developing cultural tourism can open up a direction for Vietnamese tourism to maintain its growth momentum and truly affirm the role of a spearhead economic sector, making direct and sustainable contributions to the double-digit GDP growth target set by the Government.
2026 is therefore not only the year of new figures, but also expected to open a new stage of development, where creativity and cultural industry become central driving forces, continuing to lead the journey of sublimation of Vietnamese tourism.
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