Apply for your Vietnam eVisa one to two weeks before you fly. By law, Vietnam Immigration has 3 working days to decide a complete, paid application, but weekends, Vietnamese public holidays and any request to fix your form all add days, and those days are counted in Hanoi, not where you live.
If you're working out when to apply for a Vietnam visa, the useful answer is a date on your calendar, not a count of days. If you've never filled in the Vietnam Immigration form, keep how to apply step by step open alongside this guide.
The Recommendation: One to Two Weeks Before You Fly
Vietnam Visa by BDA's terms recommend applying at least one to two weeks ahead, and the reason is arithmetic, not caution. The legal clock is a deadline, not a delivery date, and it only starts once Vietnam Immigration has the complete application and the fee, not when you open the form. Three working days is the statutory standard, and 3 to 5 working days is what usually happens. Tet and public holidays push it further.
We quote our Normal tier at 5 to 10 business days, counted from when your application reaches Vietnam Immigration. Apply two weeks out and even the 10-business-day end fits. Apply one week out and you're counting on the 5-business-day end.
The rest of the margin is for mistakes. Immigration officials said in November 2024 that incorrect or incomplete applications were causing eVisa processing delays. When Vietnam Immigration wants something fixed, the portal's status page shows "Amendment required" with a reason, and every round of that comes out of your two weeks, not theirs.
Worked back from your flight, the plan looks like this:
| If You Fly In… | Apply… | Avoid… |
|---|---|---|
| More than 2 weeks | Once flights and passport are final | Guessing at validity dates |
| 1 to 2 weeks | Today | A holiday inside your window |
| Under 1 week | Today, and consider a faster tier | Filing Friday evening, when Hanoi is already into Saturday |
| Under 24 hours | After a phone call to us | Paying before anyone confirms it's doable |
| Early to mid-February 2027 | By January 18, 2027 | The Tet closure, February 4 to 10 |
| Late November or early December 2026 | A working day earlier than usual | Vietnamese Culture Day, November 24 |
Working Days: Counted in Hanoi, Not at Home
Vietnam Immigration's portal states that declaration and processing times run on Vietnam time, and its application form even shows a live clock set to Vietnam time. Vietnam is 11 or 12 hours ahead of New York, depending on the time of year, so a Friday-evening application from the U.S. arrives on a Saturday in Hanoi.
Saturday and Sunday are the civil service's weekly days off, so that application sits until Monday. Under the law's 3 working days, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday are the days that count. You filed on Friday night your time, and the legal deadline lands on Wednesday in Hanoi.
⚠️ Don't count on anyone working your weekend. Nothing published says Vietnam Immigration processes eVisas on Saturdays or Sundays, so plan as if it doesn't. If your flight leaves on a Monday, treat the weekend before it as dead time, not processing time.
Holiday Closures: Culture Day and Tet 2027
The Government Office has approved the dates for three closures:
- Vietnamese Culture Day: civil servants get Tuesday, November 24, 2026 off.
- Tet (Lunar New Year): government offices close from Thursday, February 4 through Wednesday, February 10, 2027, seven days in all.
- National Day 2027: a four-day break from September 2 to 5, though two of those days fall on a weekend anyway.
Nothing published says eVisas are processed through Tet. The Government Office letter asks agencies to keep duty staff on so work continues, but that's a staffing instruction, not a processing promise. Plan as if Vietnam Immigration isn't working for the full seven days.
If you're flying in early or mid-February 2027, file by Monday, January 18, 2027. Ten business days from that Monday, the slow end of our Normal tier, takes you to Monday, February 1, three days before the closure starts. Culture Day costs only one working day, but it still shifts the count: file on Friday, November 20, and the legal 3 working days become Monday the 23rd, Wednesday the 25th and Thursday the 26th.
If your dates are still flexible, our guide to the best time to visit Vietnam covers the weather side of the calendar.
Validity Dates: What to Type Into the Form
You choose the eVisa's dates yourself: the application has two fields, "Grant e-Visa valid from" and "To", and won't accept a window longer than 90 days, the legal maximum for an eVisa. The Embassy of Vietnam in Washington puts the consequence plainly: you can only enter from the date of entry printed on the visa and must leave by its expiration date.
Set the start date on or before the day you land, counted on Vietnam time; after a long-haul flight from the U.S. or Europe, that can be a calendar day after the departure date on your ticket. If you're buying from us, keep the whole window inside the length you paid for: 30 days on a 1-month eVisa, 90 days on a 3-month one. Pad a 29-day trip by a day at each end and you've outgrown the 1-month option.
Vietnam Immigration's form also asks for your intended date of entry and the border gates you'll enter and leave through. Use one of the border gates on the government's eVisa list, such as Noi Bai in Hanoi, Tan Son Nhat in Ho Chi Minh City or Da Nang International Airport, and pick the gate you actually plan to use when you apply. If you'll cross out to Cambodia or Laos and back, choose multiple entry and set one window that covers every entry.
⚠️ Your flight can move earlier; your entry date doesn't move with it. If your airline pulls your arrival forward by a day, an eVisa that starts on the original date won't let you in early. Once it's approved, the portal's status page shows "Allowed to enter Viet Nam from" with the dates, so check them against your flights before you go.
How Early Is Too Early: No Published Limit, Real Constraints
Vietnam Immigration doesn't publish a limit on how far ahead you can apply, and we haven't found one. What holds you back in practice is how much the application pins down:
- Your dates. The validity window tops out at 90 days, so it has to sit around trip dates you're sure of.
- Your route and address. The form asks for your entry and exit gates and your complete intended address in Vietnam.
- Your passport. The eVisa carries one passport number, and that's the passport you have to travel on.
The UK government notes that Vietnamese authorities require visitors to enter and exit on the same passport, and Canada's travel advice warns that Vietnamese visas in expired passports aren't valid and have to be transferred to the new one. If your passport is due for renewal before or during the trip, renew it first, then apply on the new one. It also has to stay valid for at least 30 days after the eVisa ends, under Vietnam's immigration law.
So the practical answer to how early is this: as soon as your flights are booked and your passport is the one you'll carry. Applying weeks ahead also means you never pay for Urgent or Super Urgent.
Already in Vietnam: Apply From Outside the Country
The eVisa is issued to foreigners who are abroad, not to those already staying in Vietnam. Abroad means anywhere outside Vietnam, not just your home country, so applying from Bangkok or Phnom Penh before you cross the border works.
If you entered Vietnam on a visa exemption and want a longer stay on an eVisa, the UK government's advice is blunt: an eVisa you get while in Vietnam only starts after you leave and re-enter. Extensions are a separate procedure. They're done from inside Vietnam, through a sponsor (a company, organization or person in Vietnam) applying to Vietnam Immigration. We don't handle extensions.
Late Planners: What Still Works Inside a Week
Inside a week, the government site won't speed anything up: evisa.gov.vn charges $25 for single entry and $50 for multiple entry and lists no express fee, so applying early is your one lever there. Our speed tiers if you're short on time run 2 business days (Urgent, +$45 per applicant) or 1 business day (Super Urgent, +$85 per applicant).
The clock starts when your application reaches Vietnam Immigration, normally within 2 business hours of payment, not at checkout. Processing times are set by Vietnam Immigration, and so is the decision. We can file, chase and correct; we can't move an approval up the line, and a Tet week stretches Urgent just as it stretches Normal. Vietnam Visa by BDA is a private company. We're not affiliated with the Vietnamese government. Our 1-month single-entry eVisa is $54 with the $25 government fee inside it, so $29 is what you pay us to prepare, check and file it. With two weeks in hand and patience for the form, applying yourself at evisa.gov.vn is the cheaper route.
⚠️ Flying within 24 hours? Phone before paying. Call +84 832 320 320 before paying so we can tell you whether it's doable; the line is open 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. Vietnam time, any day of the week. If we can't deliver in time, we'll tell you upfront and refund, which beats paying and missing the flight.
A Few Parting Notes
Your eVisa is a PDF file you download from evisa.gov.vn; file with us and we email it to you. Open it as soon as it arrives and check it against your passport and your flights.
An issued eVisa shows the holder's full name, date of birth, passport number, the dates it's valid for and whether it's single or multiple entry. Every one of those has to match the passport you carry and the trip you're taking. A mismatch you catch weeks out leaves time to deal with it; one you catch at check-in leaves the decision to the airline. Before you fly:
- Print it and keep it on your phone. Vietnam's immigration law describes printing the eVisa from the portal, so carry a printed copy (and keep one on your phone).
- Know which site is the government's. The government's own eVisa site is evisa.gov.vn (its Vietnamese-language alias is thithucdientu.gov.vn), and the old evisa.xuatnhapcanh.gov.vn address now only shows a notice sending you there.
- Status checks need three things. If you applied yourself, the status page asks for your "e-Visa app no.", the email you used and your date of birth. There's no search by passport number.