Not for tourists. What people call the 5-year Vietnam visa is a visa exemption certificate under Decree 82/2015/ND-CP, and it's only for overseas Vietnamese and the foreign spouses and children of Vietnamese citizens or overseas Vietnamese. It lasts up to 5 years, gives you 6 months per entry and carries a $10 government fee.
Read the small print before you plan around it. The 5 years shrinks to end 6 months before your passport does, each entry earns 6 calendar months rather than 180 days, and the fee was $10 under the old schedule too. Dual nationals have a 2026 form change to read before choosing any document.
The Legal Name: A Visa Exemption Certificate, Not a Visa
The document's legal name is a visa exemption certificate (giấy miễn thị thực). It comes from Decree 82/2015/ND-CP, in force since November 15, 2015, and the Ministry of Public Security's procedure page for the certificate still lists that decree as its legal basis. It's issued for visiting relatives or handling private matters. It's normally stuck into your passport like a visa, and the decree allows a separate loose-leaf sheet in listed cases, including a passport with no visa pages left or a request from you.
The name matters because it tells you who can't get one. It exempts a defined group from needing a visa; it isn't a long tourist visa under another label. Vietnam's tourist (DL) visa and the eVisa both top out at 90 days and the law has no retirement visa, so a tourist with no Vietnamese family ties has no 5-year document to apply for.
Who Qualifies: Overseas Vietnamese, Spouses and Children
Decree 82 names three groups:
- Overseas Vietnamese (Viet Kieu), including those who now hold a foreign passport.
- Foreign spouses of Vietnamese citizens or of overseas Vietnamese.
- Foreign children of Vietnamese citizens or of overseas Vietnamese.
Notice who isn't on the list. The decree says spouse and child, so a foreign parent of a Vietnamese citizen doesn't qualify, and neither does a fiancé, a partner or a sibling. Parents have a different route: the TT visa, for parents, spouses and children of Vietnamese citizens, can be valid for up to 1 year.
You also need a passport with at least 1 year of validity left, papers that prove which group you're in, and you can't be someone Vietnam has barred from entering or leaving. The Vietnamese embassy in Washington's certificate page lists the same conditions.
The Real Length: 5 Years Is a Ceiling, Not a Promise
Two limits apply, and the shorter one wins. The certificate can't run longer than 5 years, and it has to end at least 6 months before your passport expires (Decree 82, Art. 4). Here's our arithmetic from those two rules:
- Passport with 5 years and 6 months or more left: the full 5 years.
- Passport with 3 years left: 2 years and 6 months at most.
- Passport valid for less than 1 year: no certificate, because you need at least 1 year of validity to apply.
So before you apply, take the expiry date on your passport and subtract 6 months. Your certificate can't run past that date.
⚠️ A passport near the end of its life makes a short certificate. With only 2 or 3 years left on your passport, renewing it first is usually the better buy: otherwise the certificate is cut to fit the old passport, and once it expires you're paying for a reissue on the new one.
6 Months per Entry: The Stay Rule People Misread
Each time you arrive on the certificate, the border officer grants a stay of 6 months, or whatever is left on the certificate if that's less (Decree 82, Art. 10). Some pages say 180 days per entry. The decree says 6 months, and the two don't always land on the same date, so go by the date stamped in your passport, not a day count.
If you need longer, the decree lets Immigration extend your stay by up to 6 more months if you have a sponsor in Vietnam and a legitimate reason. One provincial police procedure for this extension asks for a passport valid at least 1 year and form NA5, and charges $10 with a decision within 5 working days. We don't handle extensions; your sponsor files them. Staying past your stamp costs more: an overstay of under 16 days brings a fine of VND 500,000 to 2,000,000, and 16 days or more can also mean deportation under Decree 282/2025/ND-CP.
⚠️ Read the exit date before you leave the border desk. UK travel advice warns that if the expiry date written in your passport is wrong, you could be accused of overstaying. On a certificate, it should match your arrival plus 6 months, or the certificate's end date if that comes first.
The Cost: A $10 Government Fee
The government fee to issue or reissue a certificate is $10 under Circular 28/2026/TT-BTC, in force since April 1, 2026. That isn't a new figure: the fee schedule it replaced charged the same. Like other government visa fees, the $10 isn't refunded if you turn out not to qualify.
Abroad, the mission collects the fee. The Vietnamese embassy in Washington takes it by money order or cashier's check and doesn't print the amount on its certificate page, so ask your mission what it charges before you post anything.
Documents: Proof of Origin Is the Part That Matters
The Ministry of Public Security's procedure page lists a short file:
- Form NA9, the certificate application. Circular 70/2026/TT-BCA issued a new version from July 1, 2026, so get a current copy.
- Two recent 4x6 cm photos on a white background, facing straight ahead, bare-headed and without tinted glasses, one glued to the form and one loose.
- Your passport, valid at least 1 year.
- Papers proving you belong to one of the three groups.
For overseas Vietnamese, the decree accepts a birth certificate, a decision allowing you to give up Vietnamese nationality, a certificate of loss of nationality or another paper recording Vietnamese nationality. The Washington embassy's list goes further: a Vietnamese passport or ID card (valid or not), a family register book, a travel document, ID card or birth register extract issued before 1975, or foreign documents that show Vietnamese origin. Spouses and children send a birth or marriage certificate, plus the Vietnamese spouse's or parent's passport, birth certificate or ID and proof of that person's citizenship.
If you're mailing your file to Washington, the embassy wants it sent by Registered Mail Restricted Delivery, with the form and documents certified by a notary public. Without any of the papers above, Decree 82 still lets a mission weigh documents that record you as being of Vietnamese origin.
Where to Apply: An Embassy Abroad or Immigration in Vietnam
Abroad, start on the Foreign Ministry's online declaration site: fill in the form, print it, sign it and take the file to the nearest Vietnamese mission. If you're not sure which one covers you, start with finding your nearest Vietnamese embassy or consulate. The decree then sets the clock: the mission sends your details to Vietnam Immigration within 1 working day, Immigration answers within 3 working days and the mission issues within 1 working day of that answer (Decree 82, Art. 7). That's 5 working days on paper by our count, before any mailing time.
If you're already in Vietnam, apply to the Immigration Department, which decides within 5 working days of a complete file (procedure page). You can start online, but your passport then has to be posted to Immigration. It accepts files Monday to Saturday morning and hands back results Monday to Friday, except Tet and public holidays. These are Vietnam Immigration's deadlines, and they count from a complete file, so a missing paper adds time.
Dual Nationals: Settle Your Vietnamese Status First
Since July 1, 2026, Vietnam's new visa forms carry a note for people who hold Vietnamese and another nationality: on Vietnamese territory, Vietnam recognizes only your Vietnamese nationality, and Vietnamese citizens must use Vietnamese-issued travel documents to enter and leave (Circular 70/2026/TT-BCA). The eVisa form now asks outright whether you hold more than one nationality.
That matters here because the certificate is for overseas Vietnamese and foreigners. If you left Vietnam but never formally gave up Vietnamese citizenship, Vietnam may treat you as a citizen, and a citizen enters on Vietnamese papers.
⚠️ Ask the embassy about your citizenship before you choose a document. If there's any chance you're still a Vietnamese citizen, settle that first. The answer decides whether you need a certificate, an eVisa or a Vietnamese passport.
The 10-Year Visa and the Golden Visa: What Actually Exists
Searches for a Vietnam 10-year visa don't have a tourist answer either. Here's what does exist:
- 10-year residence cards, for a narrow group. Since July 1, 2026, temporary residence cards for ĐT1 investors and UĐ1 and UĐ2 holders can run up to 10 years (Law 118/2025/QH15).
- 5-year visas, for specific categories. LS, ĐT1, ĐT2 and the new UĐ1 and UĐ2 visas, the last two for high-skilled digital-technology workers and their families since July 1, 2026, run up to 5 years.
- A second 5-year exemption, for VIPs. A special visa exemption card, created by a government decree on special exemptions, is limited to groups such as guests of top leaders, scientists, digital-tech talent and leaders of the world's 100 largest companies by market value. It isn't for family visits.
- A golden visa, still on paper. In 2025 Vietnam's Tourism Advisory Board proposed a "golden visa" valid for 5 to 10 years; it was a proposal to the Prime Minister, not an adopted scheme (VnExpress International).
The 2026 fee schedule does list $165 for a multiple-entry visa valid over 5 to 10 years. Under the law's own caps, though, no visa runs past 5 years, and no tourist visa comes close to that.
Certificate or eVisa: Which One Fits Your Trip
| Visa Exemption Certificate | eVisa | |
|---|---|---|
| Who can get it | Overseas Vietnamese; foreign spouses and children of Vietnamese citizens or overseas Vietnamese | Citizens of every country and territory |
| Longest validity | 5 years, ending 6 months before your passport | 90 days |
| Stay per entry | 6 months | Until the end date on the eVisa |
| Government fee | $10 | $25 single, $50 multiple |
| Where you apply | Embassy or consulate, or Immigration inside Vietnam | Online, before you travel |
| Decision time | 5 working days in Vietnam | 3 working days by law |
Pick the certificate if you qualify, your passport has years left and you'll visit more than once. Pick the eVisa if you don't qualify, can't find proof of origin, need to fly before a mission can turn a file around, or your passport has less than a year left: Vietnamese law requires your visa to end at least 30 days before your passport expires (consolidated law, Art. 9); the UK and Canada advise at least 6 months' validity, and airlines often apply that rule. Some passports need neither for a short trip. If you hold a passport from Germany, France, Italy, Spain, the UK, Russia, Japan, South Korea, Denmark, Sweden, Norway or Finland, you can stay up to 45 days without a visa, for any purpose, under Resolution 44/NQ-CP, which runs until March 14, 2028.
You can apply for the eVisa yourself through Vietnam Immigration's own site, evisa.gov.vn, and pay only the $25 single or $50 multiple stamp fee. Or we prepare, check and file it for you: prices start at $54 per applicant for a 1-month single-entry eVisa, with the Vietnam Immigration stamp fee included, and our eVisa prices list the other three options. Vietnam Visa by BDA is a private company. We're not affiliated with the Vietnamese government. Both timelines in the table are Vietnam Immigration's, not ours. US passport holders can read the eVisa rules for US citizens, and our complete Vietnam visa guide covers the rest.
A Few Parting Notes
A child who shares a parent's passport goes on that parent's certificate (Decree 82). A certificate that's lost, damaged, expired or carries details that need correcting is reissued, and the reissue fee is the same $10 as a new one.
The certificate covers visiting family and personal matters. If the plan becomes a job in Vietnam, you're into work visas (LĐ1 and LĐ2, valid up to 2 years), which we don't handle. And whoever helps with the paperwork, the decision belongs to Vietnam Immigration and the mission that issues the certificate.