Demographics of Vietnam

Demographic features of the population of Vietnam include population density, ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects of the population.
Ethnic Vietnamese, or the Viet people, live in the lowlands and speak the Vietnamese language, as opposed to the many ethnic groups of Vietnam who are known to occupy the mountainous regions. Originating in northern Vietnam, the Viet gradually pushed southward and make up much of Vietnam's political landscape. Alongside them, other ethnicities also contribute to the country's diverse demographic composition.
Vietnam's population reached just over 100 million in 2023, making it the 15th largest country by population in the world. It is predicted that by 2035, Vietnam will become an aged society.

Population size and structure

Historic estimates

	Total population
0	ca. 800 000
500	ca. 550 000
1000	ca. 800 000
1500	2 000 000
1700	3 000 000
1850	6 110 000
1900	11 700 000
1930	17 500 000

	Total population
1000	ca. 1 200 000
1100	ca. 1 500 000
1200	ca. 2 000 000
1300	ca. 2 400 000
1400	1 800 000
1500	4 400 000
1600	5 000 000
1700	6 300 000
1800	7 500 000

Population by age groups

Age group	Male	Female	Total	%
Total	42,413,143	43,433,854	85,846,997	100
0–4	3,662,889	3,371,255	7,034,144	7.97
5–9	3,458,159	3,252,578	6,710,737	7.82
10–14	3,725,369	3,523,009	7,248,378	8.44
15–19	4,577,914	4,385,988	8,963,902	10.44
20–24	4,253,618	4,179,249	8,432,867	9.82
25–29	3,904,730	3,885,273	7,790,003	9.07
30–34	3,462,905	3,405,253	6,868,158	8.00
35–39	3,298,266	3,233,341	6,531,607	7.61
40–44	2,967,934	2,998,922	5,966,856	6.95
45–49	2,642,466	2,808,462	5,450,928	6.35
50–54	2,082,098	2,329,953	4,412,051	5.14
55–59	1,364,319	1,620,300	2,984,619	3.48
60–64	861 897	1,076,051	1,937,948	2.26
65–69	653 287	901 391	1,554,678	1.81
70–74	568 312	844 226	1,412,538	1.65
75–79	480 088	718 805	1,198,893	1.40
80–84	264 997	460 988	725 985	0.85
85+	183 895	438 810	622 705	0.73
Age group	Male	Female	Total	Percent
0–4	10,846,417	10,146,842	20,993,259	24.45
15–64	29,416,147	29,922,792	59,338,939	69.12
65+	2,150,579	3,364,220	5,514,799	6.42

Age group	Male	Female	Total	%
Total	44,758,132	45,970,809	90,728,941	100
0–4	3,806,055	3,423,520	7,229,575	7.97
5–9	3,730,617	3,431,843	7,162,460	7.89
10–14	3,555,440	3,344,659	6,900,099	7.61
15–19	3,580,322	3,413,183	6,993,505	7.71
20–24	4,058,691	3,959,579	8,018,270	8.84
25–29	3,951,220	3,888,697	7,839,917	8.64
30–34	3,689,395	3,769,601	7,458,996	8.22
35–39	3,390,462	3,439,787	6,830,249	7.53
40–44	3,292,933	3,295,012	6,587,945	7.26
45–49	2,980,442	3,068,389	6,048,831	6.67
50–54	2,699,165	2,971,459	5,670,624	6.25
55–59	2,096,032	2,405,568	4,501,600	4.96
60–64	1,376,861	1,671,621	3,048,482	3.36
65–69	832 090	1,084,870	1,916,960	2.11
70–74	600 732	862 104	1,462,836	1.61
75–79	477 293	757 242	1,234,535	1.36
80+	640 382	1,183,675	1,824,057	2.01
Age group	Male	Female	Total	Percent
0–14	11,092,112	10,200,022	21,292,134	23.47
15–64	31,115,523	31,882,896	62,998,419	69.44
65+	2,550,497	3,887,891	6,438,388	7.10

Age group	Male	Female	Total	%
Total	47,881,061	48,327,923	96,208,984	100
0–4	4,100,479	3,718,847	7,819,326	8.13
5–9	4,354,887	3,977,832	8,332,719	8.66
10–14	3,737,030	3,482,807	7,219,837	7.50
15–19	3,352,386	3,153,831	6,506,217	6.76
20–24	3,417,149	3,258,554	6,675,703	6.94
25–29	4,301,210	4,146,767	8,447,977	8.78
30–34	4,276,404	4,117,406	8,393,810	8.72
35–39	3,891,950	3,800,436	7,692,386	8.00
40–44	3,366,147	3,317,972	6,684,119	6.95
45–49	3,132,172	3,125,299	6,257,471	6.50
50–54	2,772,157	2,889,853	5,662,010	5.89
55–59	2,402,096	2,706,628	5,108,724	5.31
60–64	1,810,497	2,181,537	3,992,034	4.15
65–69	1,167,214	1,518,057	2,685,271	2.79
70–74	687 339	953 511	1,640,850	1.71
75–79	453 972	717 839	1,171,811	1.22
80–84	327 330	580 402	907 732	0.94
85+	330 642	680 345	1,010,987	1.05
Age group	Male	Female	Total	Percent
0–14	12,192,396	11,179,486	23,371,882	24.29
15–64	32,722,168	32,698,283	65,420,451	68.00
65+	2,966,497	4,350,211	7,416,651	7.71

Source: UN Statistics Division.

Sex ratio

Source: General Statistics Office of Vietnam.

Vital statistics

Registered births and deaths

The total fertility rate of Vietnam has been influenced by the government's family planning policy, the two-child policy.

	Average population	Live births	Deaths	Natural change	Crude birth rate	Crude death rate	Natural change	Total fertility rate
1990	66,016,700
1991	67,242,400
1992	68,450,100
1993	69,644,500
1994	70,824,500
1995	71,995,500
1996	73,156,700
1997	74,306,900
1998	75,456,300
1999	76,596,700
2000	77,630,900
2001	78,620,500	1,462,300	401,000	1,061,300	18.6	5.1	13.5	2.25
2002	79,537,700	1,511,200	461,300	1,049,900	19.0	5.8	13.2	2.28
2003	80,467,400	1,408,200	466,700	941,500	17.5	5.8	11.7	2.12
2004	81,436,400	1,563,600	439,800	1,123,800	19.2	5.4	13.8	2.23
2005	82,392,100	1,532,500	436,700	1,095,800	18.6	5.3	13.3	2.11
2006	83,311,200	1,449,600	441,500	1,008,100	17.4	5.3	12.1	2.09
2007	84,218,500	1,423,300	446,400	976,900	16.9	5.3	11.6	2.07
2008	85,118,700	1,421,500	451,100	970,400	16.7	5.3	11.4	2.08
2009	86,025,000	1,514,000	585,000	929,000	17.6	6.8	10.8	2.03
2010	86,947,400	1,486,800	591,200	895,600	17.1	6.8	10.3	2.00
2011	87,860,400	1,458,500	606,200	852,300	16.6	6.9	9.7	1.99
2012	88,809,300	1,500,900	621,700	879,200	16.9	7.0	9.9	2.05
2013	89,759,500	1,525,900	637,300	888,600	17.0	7.1	9.9	2.10
2014	90,728,900	1,560,500	626,000	934,500	17.2	6.9	10.3	2.09
2015	91,709,800	1,485,700	623,600	862,100	16.2	6.8	9.4	2.10
2016	92,692,200	1,483,100	630,300	852,800	16.0	6.8	9.2	2.09
2017	93,671,600	1,395,700	637,000	758,700	14.9	6.8	8.1	2.04
2018	94,666,000	1,382,100	643,700	738,400	14.6	6.8	7.8	2.05
2019	96,484,000	1,572,700	607,800	964,900	16.3	6.3	10.0	2.09
2020	97,582,690	1,590,600	591,400	999,200	16.3	6.1	10.2	2.12
2021	98,506,190	1,550,500	628,700	922,000	15.7	6.4	9.3	2.11
2022	99,461,700	1,511,800	606,700	905,100	15.2	6.1	9.1	2.01
2023	100,309,200	1,424,400	571,800	852,600	14.2	5.7	8.5	1.96
2024	101,300,000	1,367,600	567,300	800,300	13.5	5.6	7.9	1.91
2025	102,300,000				13.7	6.1	7.6	1.93

Source: General Statistics Office of Vietnam.

Fertility rate by region and province

Source: General Statistics Office of Vietnam.

Life expectancy

Period	Life expectancy in Years	Period	Life expectancy in Years
1955–1960	57.3	1990–1995	71.2
1960–1965	60.5	1995–2000	72.7
1965–1970	62.3	2000–2005	73.8
1970–1975	57.8	2005–2010	74.7
1975–1980	66.1	2010–2015	75.6
1980–1985	68.1

Source: UN World Population Prospects.

Ethnic groups

The Vietnamese government recognizes 54 ethnic groups, of which the Viet is the largest; according to official Vietnamese figures, ethnic Vietnamese account for 85.3% of the nation's population and the non-Vietnamese ethnic groups account for the remaining portion. The ethnic Vietnamese inhabit a little less than half of Vietnam, while the ethnic minorities inhabit the majority of Vietnam's land.
The relation between China and Vietnam also declined following reunification in 1976, with Vietnam siding with the Soviet Union against China in the Chinese-Soviet split. Tensions peaked when Vietnam and Cambodia started a war, Cambodia led by Pol Pot being a Chinese ally, resulting in a Chinese invasion of Vietnam in 1979. In 1978–79, some 450,000 ethnic Chinese left Vietnam by boat as refugees or were expelled across the land border with China. In recent years the government has performed an about turn and is encouraging overseas Hoa to return and invest, but the ethnic Chinese population has been in continuous decline since the 1970s due to assimilation and low birth rates.
The central highland peoples commonly termed Degar or Montagnards comprise two main ethnolinguistic groups – Malayo-Polynesian and Mon–Khmer. About 30 groups of various cultures and dialects are spread over the highland territory.
Other minority groups include the Cham—remnants of the once-mighty Champa Kingdom, conquered by the Vietnamese in the 15th century, Hmong, and Thái.

Languages

Vietnamese is the national language. It belongs to the Austroasiatic language family, which also includes languages such as Khmer and Mon. Vietnamese was spoken by 85–90 million people in Vietnam at the 1999 census. In the early 21st century, around another four million Vietnamese speakers are found outside of Vietnam, mostly refugees from the Vietnam-American War. Thus Vietnamese is the most spoken language of the Austroasiatic family, being spoken by three times more people than the second most spoken language of the family, Khmer. Both languages, however, are extremely different: Vietnamese is a tonal, monosyllabic language while Khmer has remained non-tonal. Vietnamese was heavily influenced by Chinese, with up to around 50–70% words having Chinese origins, whilst Khmer was heavily influenced by Sanskrit and Pali, uses an abugida writing system, and has a great part of its vocabulary originating from Indian languages. Since the early 20th century, the Vietnamese have used a Romanized script introduced by the French, developed by Jesuit missionaries led by Alexandre de Rhodes and later on, refined by Vietnamese scholars to produce what is now known as the Vietnamese alphabet.

Religion

According to the 2019 Census, the religious demographics of Vietnam are as follows:

86.32% Vietnamese folk religion or non-religious
6.1% Catholicism
4.79% Buddhism
1.02% Hoahaoism
1% Protestantism<1% Caodaism
0.77 Others

It is worth noting here that the data is highly skewed, as a large majority of Vietnamese may declare themselves atheist yet practice forms of traditional folk religion or Mahayana Buddhism.
Estimates for the year 2010 published by the Pew Research Center:

Vietnamese folk religion, 45.3%
Unaffiliated, 29.6%
Buddhism, 16.4%
Christianity, 8.2%
Other, 0.5%