Vietnam lifts regional minimum wages by up to 390,000 VND from 2027

Vietnam will raise its monthly regional minimum wages by between 310,000 VND and 390,000 VND (roughly $12 to $15) on January 1, 2027, under Decree No. 399/2026/ND-CP, which replaces Decree 293/2025 from the same date. The government paired the increase with a prohibition: employers may not abolish or reduce overtime pay, night-work premiums, in-kind compensation or other statutory entitlements while adjusting contracts to the new floors.

The increase touches every employer with staff on Vietnamese labor contracts. Companies must now review labor contracts, collective labor agreements (negotiated deals between an employer and a workforce representative body) and internal work rules, then amend them to match the new floors — without clawing back benefits elsewhere. The government's instruction is blunt on that point. Employers that try to fund the wage rise by trimming entitlements will be in breach of the decree.

What do the new floors look like?

Vietnam sets minimum wages by region, with Zone I covering the most developed urban areas and Zone IV the least. The monthly floors move as follows:

• Zone I: from 5,310,000 VND to 5,700,000 VND, up 390,000 VND
• Zone II: from 4,730,000 VND to 5,080,000 VND, up 350,000 VND
• Zone III: from 4,140,000 VND to 4,450,000 VND, up 310,000 VND
• Zone IV: from 3,700,000 VND to 4,040,000 VND, up 340,000 VND

The percentage uplift is modest — between roughly 7% and 7.3% across the four zones, comparable to a cost-of-living adjustment rather than a structural pay reform. But for payroll teams, a floor increase is never just arithmetic. Anything pegged to the minimum — allowances, threshold tests, benefit calculations — moves with it.

How do the hourly rates change?

The decree also resets hourly minimums in all four regions:

• Zone I: from 25,500 VND to 27,400 VND per hour
• Zone II: from 22,700 VND to 24,400 VND per hour
• Zone III: from 20,000 VND to 21,400 VND per hour
• Zone IV: from 17,800 VND to 19,400 VND per hour

The hourly figure derives from dividing a weekly or daily wage by normal working hours, or from dividing piece-rate or contract wages by the hours normally needed to produce a product or complete a contracted task. Employers running piecework arrangements should recalculate those conversions before the January deadline rather than after a labor inspection invites them to.

What survives the transition?

Existing terms that are more generous than the new decree remain in force unless the parties agree otherwise. The decree names three protected categories explicitly:

• A wage system for jobs or positions requiring vocational training, at least 7% above the minimum wage
• A wage system for arduous, hazardous or dangerous jobs, at least 5% above the rate for equivalent work under normal conditions
• A wage system for exceptionally arduous, hazardous or dangerous jobs, at least 7% above the rate for equivalent work under normal conditions

These premiums sit on top of the floor, not within it. An employer cannot absorb the vocational-training differential into the new minimum and call the package compliant.

Who carries implementation duty?

The decree assigns responsibility to ministers, heads of ministerial-level agencies, chairpersons of provincial and city People's Committees, and employers themselves. In practice, that puts the compliance burden where it usually lands: on the company's own review of contracts and collective agreements before the effective date.

Decree No. 399/2026/ND-CP takes effect January 1, 2027, the same day Decree 293/2025/ND-CP — dated November 10, 2025 — ceases to apply. Employers with Vietnamese workforces have a full budget cycle to reprice their pay structures; whether they use it or scramble in December is the only open question.