Working Time Rules: Vietnam
Vietnam: working hours, holiday calendars and annual leave rules for practical workforce planning.
This is a general overview, not legal advice. Limits, reference periods, exceptions, and record-keeping duties vary by sector and contract and change over time. Confirm the current rules with the official source and a qualified adviser.
Working week used in calculations40 hours per week8 hours a day over 5 days
Minimum annual leave12 working days in normal conditionsVietnam Social Security explains twelve working days of annual leave after twelve months for normal working conditions, fourteen for specified protected or hazardous categories, and sixteen for especially hazardous work. These are working-day units. Determine the employee category and service entitlement before deducting leave from the calendar total.Source
Statutory working time
Vietnam’s public-employee holiday breaks cannot be copied directly into every private-company calendar. Private employers select permitted Tet and National Day arrangements and must communicate them in advance. The eight-hour, five-day table is editable. Extra foreign-worker holidays, substitute rest and any official swapped working Saturdays require the employer’s actual schedule.
What to check before you rely on this
- The current statutory limits, reference periods, and any opt-outs.
- Sector or collective-agreement rules that may override the defaults.
- How overtime is authorised, recorded, and compensated.
- What working-time records you must keep and for how long.