Vietnam · Central Coast
Hoi An
Vietnam's best-preserved old town, lantern-lit and largely traffic-free, ten minutes by bike from the sea.
Hoi An is a preserved trading port on Vietnam's central coast, where a UNESCO-listed Ancient Town of ochre shophouses, Chinese assembly halls and the Japanese Covered Bridge sits a short cycle from rice paddies and a long white beach. It is a walking, eating and tailoring town: cao lau by the river, silk lanterns after dark, and a bicycle as the only transport you need.
Suggested stay
3–5 days
Language
Vietnamese
Currency
VND
Timezone
UTC+7
Why you'll love Hoi An
The Ancient Town Two centuries of Japanese, Chinese and Vietnamese shophouses kept intact, closed to cars for much of the day and lit by silk lanterns after dark.
Food A town with its own dishes - cao lau noodles, white rose dumplings, com ga chicken rice, and a banh mi culture people fly in for.
Tailors Hundreds of shops that will cut a suit, a dress or a pair of shoes to measure inside a day or two.
Beach and paddies An Bang's sand and the Tra Que herb gardens are both a flat, fifteen-minute bicycle ride from the old streets.
Best time to visit
Jan-Apr
Mild & dry · 25-32° days
15.888° N, 108.337° E
UTC+7 · Asia/Ho Chi Minh
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Weather & when to go to Hoi An
Month by month: typical highs and lows, rainfall and rain days.
✓ Best Jan-Apr
Conditions Jan Mild & dry · Feb Driest period · Mar Warm & dry · Apr Beach season · May Heating up · Jun Very hot · Jul-Aug Hot & dry · Sep Typhoon risk · Oct Monsoon peak · Nov Monsoon · Dec Rains easing
Watch for Jun-Jul extreme heat risk · Jul-Oct typhoons risk · Sep-Nov monsoon flooding risk
Cards tinted by verified verdict · big number = typical daily high, small = low · hover for conditions
When to avoid Hoi An
September to November is the wet, typhoon-prone stretch, and the Thu Bon regularly floods the Ancient Town's lanes - shops board up and boats replace bicycles for a few days at a time. Midsummer is dry but very hot and busy.
Top things to do in Hoi An
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Japanese Covered Bridge - the town's emblem
history culture arts 👍 PopularA roofed bridge with a small temple built into its span, raised by the Japanese merchant community to reach the Chinese quarter across the creek. It is the image on the national banknote and the one thing everyone photographs, so come early or late.
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Fujian Assembly Hall - the grandest of the congregation halls
history culture artsHoi An's Chinese communities each built their own hall, and the Fujian one is the show-stopper: a triple gate, a courtyard of bonsai and dragons, and a shrine to Thien Hau, the sea goddess who kept their ships afloat, under slow-burning incense coils.
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Tan Ky House - a merchant home still lived in
historyA two-century-old shophouse that runs from the street through to the river, mixing Japanese, Chinese and Vietnamese carpentry with mother-of-pearl inlay. The same family still occupies it, and the marks on the wall record how high each big flood reached.
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Cao lau and white rose - eat the dishes Hoi An invented
food ⭐ Highly recommendedCao lau is chewy pork noodles that locals insist only work with water from the town's old well; white rose is translucent shrimp dumplings made by a handful of families. Add com ga chicken rice and the banh mi carts, and eating is half the reason to stay.
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Thu Bon riverfront - lanterns and a sampan at dusk
culture arts scenic 👍 PopularAs the light goes, silk lanterns come on along both banks, rowers push out with candles for hire and the An Hoi footbridge fills with the night market crowd. Touristy and completely worth doing once.
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Hoi An tailors - something made to measure
shopping 👍 PopularTailors, cobblers and silk shops fill whole streets, working from a photo or a garment you already own. Order in your first day or two so there is room for a second fitting; quality ranges from superb to slapdash, so ask around before committing.
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An Bang Beach - the town's stretch of sand
scenicA long, palm-backed beach with loungers and simple seafood shacks, reached on a flat cycle out through the paddies. Calm and swimmable in the dry months, churned up and windy once the northeast monsoon arrives.
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Tra Que herb village - garden work and a cooking class
food nature wildlife ⭐ Highly recommendedA village of sandy market-garden beds fertilised with river weed, supplying the herbs every Hoi An dish leans on. Most visits pair an hour of hoeing and watering with a class that ends in lunch you made yourself.
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Cam Thanh coconut palms - a basket boat through the water palms
nature wildlife scenicRound bamboo thung chai boats paddle the nipa palm channels that once hid fighters from patrols. Go early: by mid-morning it can turn into a loud flotilla with speakers and spinning-boat displays.
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Hoi An Central Market - the town's kitchen
food shoppingBest in the first hours of daylight, when the herb sellers, fish trays and butchers are working and the food stalls at the back are serving breakfast to people who live here rather than visit.
Best areas to stay in Hoi An
$ Budget $$ Mid-range $$$ Premium
Ancient Town
First-time visitors $$Lantern-lit heritage shophouses, largely car-free
Explore hotels in Ancient Town →
An Bang Beach
Beach stays $$Palm-backed sand, low-key beach shacks
Explore hotels in An Bang Beach →
An Hoi
Budget and nightlife $Riverside night market, pool hotels, walkable
Explore hotels in An Hoi →
Cam Nam
Quiet and local $Quiet river island, local eating
Explore hotels in Cam Nam →
Cam Thanh and the paddy outskirts
Countryside stays $Rice fields, water palms, homestays and villas
Explore hotels in Cam Thanh and the paddy outskirts →
Live nightly prices from Booking.com, Agoda and others, centred on Hoi An
Getting to & around Hoi An
Getting there
Fly into Da Nang, then about 45 minutes by road down the coast to Hoi An.
Flight
Da Nang International Airport (DAD)
Roughly 30 km north of town; a taxi or booked car runs the coast road to the edge of the Ancient Town in about 45 minutes, and almost every hotel will arrange the pickup.
Train
Da Nang Station
The Reunification Line stops in Da Nang, then it is a road transfer. The Hue to Da Nang leg round the Hai Van headland is one of the best rides in the country.
Coach
Hoi An bus station
Sleeper buses run up the coast from Nha Trang and down from Hue and Phong Nha, dropping in town or just outside it.
Drive
From Hue, the Hai Van Pass is a spectacular half-day drive or motorbike ride, with the tunnel underneath as the fast alternative.
Getting around
Bicycle
The default here. Flat, short distances, and most places to stay lend one out.
TBC
Walking
The Ancient Town closes to cars and motorbikes for much of the day.
Free
Motorbike or scooter
Easy to hire for the beach, the paddies and Da Nang. Helmets are compulsory.
TBC
Taxi and ride-hailing
Metered taxis and app-booked cars and bikes cover the beach and airport runs.
TBC
Day trips from Hoi An
My Son Sanctuary
Half dayCham temple ruins
Brick towers of the Cham kingdom in a jungle valley, built and rebuilt over roughly a thousand years and heavily bombed in the war. Go at opening time, before the heat and the coaches.
Getting there
car | tour
About 1 hour each way by car or on a tour
Marble Mountains
Half dayCave temples and lookouts
Five limestone hills riddled with caves turned into Buddhist shrines, with a lift to the main summit and a view down the whole beach. Stone carvers still work the village at the foot.
Getting there
car
About 30 minutes by car up the coast road
Da Nang and Son Tra
Full dayCity and coast
The big modern city up the beach: the Dragon Bridge, a long seafront, and the Lady Buddha statue on the Son Tra peninsula looking back over the bay.
Getting there
car | bus
About 45 minutes by car, or by local bus from Hoi An bus station
Ba Na Hills and the Golden Bridge
Full dayCable car hill station
A very long cable car climbs to a French-styled resort village and the Golden Bridge, carried on two giant stone hands. It is a theme park rather than a mountain, and often sits in cloud.
Getting there
car | tour
About 1.5 hours each way by car or on a tour
Hue
Full dayImperial city
The Nguyen dynasty citadel and the emperors' tombs along the Perfume River. Doable in a long day over the pass, much better as an overnight if the itinerary allows.
Getting there
car | train
About 3 hours each way by car over the Hai Van Pass, or by train from Da Nang
Cham Islands
Full daySnorkelling islands
A small marine-park archipelago with clear water, snorkelling and a working fishing village. Boats run only in the calmer months and are pulled the moment the sea gets up, so treat it as a fair-weather plan.
Getting there
ferry | tour
About 30 minutes by speedboat from Cua Dai, almost always as a tour
A little history of Hoi An
Hoi An was Faifo, for a stretch of the 16th and 17th centuries one of the busiest ports in Southeast Asia. Ships worked the monsoon winds in and out of the Thu Bon estuary, and Japanese and Chinese merchants stayed on between sailings long enough to build their own quarters, assembly halls and the covered bridge that still joins them. The same river mouth had served the Cham kingdom before that, whose spiritual capital sat inland at My Son.
Then the river silted, the deep-water trade moved to Da Nang, and Hoi An simply stopped. That poverty is why the town survives: nobody had the money to knock the shophouses down, and the war largely passed it by. UNESCO listed the Ancient Town in 1999, the same year catastrophic floods swept central Vietnam, and visitors have been the town's business ever since.
Cham kings begin building the temple complex at My Son, up the valley from the river mouth.
Dai Viet armies push south and absorb the Cham heartland around the Thu Bon.
The Nguyen lords open the estuary to foreign traders; the port becomes known abroad as Faifo.
Japanese and Chinese merchant quarters take root, and the covered bridge is built to link them.
Japan's closed-country edicts cut the Japanese trade, and the Chinese congregations take over the port.
Fujian, Cantonese and Hainanese congregations build the assembly halls that still line Tran Phu.
The Thu Bon silts up, shipping shifts to Da Nang, and Hoi An slips into a long quiet.
UNESCO lists the Ancient Town as a World Heritage Site.
Tailoring, lantern-making and tourism replace fishing and farming as the town's living.
Know before you go
Payment
Cash preferred
English
Limited
Wifi
Reliable
Power
Type A / B / C
230 V, 50 Hz
Dialing
+84
Extreme heat risk in this window; check current conditions before you go.
Typhoons risk in this window; check current conditions before you go.
Monsoon flooding risk in this window; check current conditions before you go.
The months our climate read flags to avoid: the wettest, lowest-rated weather of the year.
Mobile network & SIM card
Get an eSIM before you fly
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FAQs about Hoi An
▸ When is the best time to visit Hoi An?
January to April is the pick: dry, warm rather than fierce, and easy for cycling between the old town and the beach. September to November is the wet, typhoon-prone stretch, when the Thu Bon can put the old streets under water.
▸ How many days do I need?
Three days covers the Ancient Town, the beach and one trip out. Five lets you add My Son, a cooking class and a tailoring fitting or two without rushing any of it.
▸ Do I need a ticket for the Ancient Town?
Yes, for the heritage sites. One Ancient Town ticket admits you to a set number of the old houses, assembly halls and museums, and booths at the entrances to the old streets sell it. Simply walking and eating in the quarter needs no ticket.
▸ Is Hoi An really the place to get clothes made?
It is what many people come for. Whole streets are tailors and cobblers, and turnaround is a day or two. Order early in your stay so there is time for a second fitting, and ask other travellers who they used - quality varies enormously between shops.
▸ Should I stay in the town or at the beach?
The Ancient Town if you want the lanes at dawn and after dark; An Bang if you want sea air and a quieter night. They are a flat fifteen-minute bike ride apart, so neither choice cuts you off from the other.
▸ Does Hoi An actually flood?
Most years, in October and November. The Thu Bon backs up, shopkeepers move stock upstairs and boats work the lanes for a few days. The town takes it in its stride and it drains quickly, but it can write off a short trip.
More in Vietnam
Da Nang
Thirty kilometres of city beach, a river full of lit bridges, and central Vietnam's best days out all inside an hour's drive.
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