Tet Vietnamese Festival

Tết Nguyên Đán: the Vietnamese Lunar New Year

Tết Nguyên Đán, usually just called Tết, marks the 1st day of the 1st month of the Vietnamese lunisolar calendar. That puts it somewhere between late January and mid-February. Vietnam follows the Sino-Vietnamese calendar, the same one China uses, so Tết and Chinese New Year normally fall on the same date. A handful of years are the exception: the time-zone gap between UTC+7 and UTC+8 occasionally pushes the new moon onto a different day in each country.

Boiled down, the astronomical rule reads Tết = first new moon between Jan 21 and Feb 20. Every year carries one of the 12 zodiac animals (Tý/Rat, Sửu/Buffalo, Dần/Tiger…). Two of them differ from the Chinese line-up: Vietnam keeps the Cat (Mão) instead of the Rabbit, and the Buffalo in place of the Ox.

Traditions & symbols

Families come together to make bánh chưng, a square sticky-rice cake wrapped in dong leaves that stands for the Earth, alongside its rounded southern cousin bánh tét. Kids get lì xì, the red envelopes stuffed with lucky money. Houses go up with peach blossoms in the north and apricot blossoms in the south, and people pay close attention to who walks in first that year (xông đất) since that visitor is said to shape the family’s fortune.

FAQ

Is Tết always the same day as Chinese New Year? Nearly always. Each calendar works out the new moon at its own meridian, which is why a few years per century come out one day apart.

How long does the holiday last? The official break in Vietnam runs 5–7 days, though the festivities tend to fill the whole first lunar week.

How accurate is this calculator? It leans on simplified astronomical tables, which are fine for learning. When you need a legal or official date, check the Vietnamese government calendar instead.