Vietnam's Birth Rate: Big Cities, an Ageing Country and a Ten-Year Window

In 2023, Ho Chi Minh City's birth rate was 1.32 children per woman. Japan's was 1.20. Vietnam as a whole reached 1.91 in 2024, its lowest on record and below 2.1, the level at which a population keeps its size without migration. Here is what the numbers show, why big cities have fewer children, and why the timing matters for Vietnam's economy.

The numbers

For almost 15 years, from 2009 to 2022, Vietnam's birth rate stayed close to the replacement level. Then it fell quickly:

• 2021: 2.11 children per woman
• 2022: 2.01
• 2023: 1.96
• 2024: 1.91, the lowest on record
• 2025: 1.93, a small rise, still below 2.1

By 2024, only 17% of provinces and cities were still at or above 2.1. Ho Chi Minh City, the country's largest city, is now closer to Japan than to Vietnam's national average.

Why big cities have fewer children

The gap between city and countryside is large. In Vietnam's 2024 mid-term census, the birth rate was 1.67 in urban areas and 2.08 in rural areas.

Vietnam is not unusual here. In 2023, Tokyo was at 0.99 against 1.20 for Japan, and Seoul was at 0.55 against 0.72 for South Korea.

The reasons Vietnamese researchers and officials name are the reasons of big-city life anywhere:

• Cost. Housing, education and healthcare cost more in cities, and young couples weigh that before having children.
• Careers. People in cities study longer and build careers first. Many couples put career and quality of life ahead of a larger family.
• Timing. Younger Vietnamese delay marriage and parenthood until they feel financially secure.

These are choices people make about their own lives, and people in Seoul, Singapore or Berlin make the same ones. A lower birth rate in a city says more about what city life costs and offers than about any one group. Vietnamese women in particular work, study and lead at high rates, in cities most of all.

Getting old before getting rich

Japan and South Korea became high-income countries before their populations aged. Vietnam is ageing while it is still a middle-income country. A 2021 World Bank and JICA report described Vietnam as at risk of getting old before getting rich.

The timeline is short:

• Golden years until about 2036. Officials expect Vietnam's "golden" population period, when people of working age far outnumber children and the elderly, to end around 2036.
• An aged society by 2036, super-aged by 2049. In 2024, 14.2 million Vietnamese were aged 60 or older, and that number is expected to reach 18 million by 2030.
• A shrinking population from the 2050s. The population is expected to start falling between 2054 and 2059.

That leaves about ten years in which most of Vietnam's working-age population is still growing or stable. High income, its own brands and its own technology: much of what Vietnam wants to become has to be built in that window.

What Vietnam is doing

In December 2025, the National Assembly passed Vietnam's first Population Law. It took effect on 1 July 2026 and replaced the two-child framework in place since 1988. The law states that each couple decides when to have children, how many and how far apart. It adds support for families with children, such as longer paid leave for a second child, and measures for elderly care.

Whether incentives change birth rates is an open question. Japan and South Korea have spent heavily on similar measures for years, and both still have some of the lowest birth rates in the world.

What it means for Overseas Vietnamese

Fewer young people entering the workforce from the 2030s means employers will compete harder for skilled people. That competition has already started: in a 2026 Robert Walters survey, up to 80% of employers in Vietnam said they struggle to find the right candidates.

For Overseas Vietnamese with skills and experience built abroad, a tighter labour market in Vietnam is likely to mean more demand, not less.

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