Things to Do in Hoi An: 12 Offbeat Picks
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Hoi An rewards you for slowing down more than almost anywhere else in Vietnam, because most of what’s worth doing here is small: a craft village, a market, a single well-run tailor. This list runs 12 things to actually do in town, in roughly the order to tackle them over 2-3 days, plus the two day trips worth booking ahead. Nothing on it needs a mountain or a beach body, which is the point.
Things to do in Hoi An’s Ancient Town
1. Walk the heritage core. Start with the Japanese Covered Bridge (Chua Cau), the 18th-century icon that reopened in 2024 after a restoration some locals think looks too new, then take in the Chinese assembly halls (Fujian is the grandest) and a merchant house like Tan Ky.
2. Only buy the coupon booklet if you’re going inside buildings. Walking the streets is free. The roughly 120,000 VND “Old Town ticket” is really 5 coupons for entry to about 20 heritage sites, checked door by door, not at a gate (verify current price).
3. Take a lantern boat out after dark. Any night, not just the monthly Full Moon Lantern Festival on the 14th lunar day, you can float a candle-lantern down the Thu Bon from a rented rowboat.
4. Get fitted for something real, not the 24-hour rush job. With around 400 tailor shops in town, the honest approach is 2-3 quotes, one test item first, and a proper fitting; true bespoke takes 3-5 days, not overnight.
Things to do that get you out of the Old Town
5. Take a cooking class and market tour. Most classes start with a guided walk through a produce market before you learn to make cao lau or banh xeo.
6. Cycle to Tra Que before the tour buses. The Tra Que herb village has been farmed with riverweed fertiliser for around 400 years, and it’s calmest at dawn.
7. Take the calm basket boat, not the loud one. Cam Thanh’s water-coconut village runs the round thung chai basket boats; ask for an early or late slot to skip the viral spinning “dance” and the boat-jam crowds.
8. Cross to Cam Kim island. A short ferry or bike ride over the Thu Bon reaches a much quieter island of rice paddies and small workshops.
9. Compare the Central Market to the Morning Market. The Central Market is built for photos and souvenirs; the Morning Market a few streets away is where locals buy fish and produce at local prices.
10. Shop where the staff write instead of speak. Reaching Out, at 131 Tran Phu, is a deaf-run fair-trade crafts shop selling lacquerware and silk, with orders handled by handwritten note.
Do these need a full day trip?
11. My Son Sanctuary. Yes, book a morning for it. These red-brick Cham Hindu temple ruins, about an hour southwest and UNESCO-listed since 1999, still show bomb craters from a week of US bombing in August 1969. Go early, before the heat and the bus groups arrive.
12. Da Nang: the Golden Bridge and Marble Mountains. Also yes, but expect a full day. The Golden Bridge’s giant stone hands, about 1,400 metres up at Ba Na Hills, are unapologetically manufactured and still worth the cable car ride; the Marble Mountains add caves, pagodas, and a stair climb on the way back.
How many days do you actually need for this list?
Two full days covers the Old Town items (1-4) plus one out-of-town activity like the cooking class or Tra Que. Add a third day if you want both My Son and Da Nang, since trying to cram both into one day means rushing at least one of them.
| Activity | Typical time | Rough cost |
|---|---|---|
| Old Town heritage walk (free) | 2-3 hours | Free, or ~120,000 VND with coupons |
| Cooking class + market tour | half day | ~$15-30 |
| Basket boat (Cam Thanh) | 1 hour | ~90,000 VND+ per person |
| My Son day trip | half day | varies by tour |
| Da Nang / Golden Bridge day trip | full day | varies by tour |
For the food side of numbers 5 and 9, see where to eat in Hoi An , and for the fuller My Son and Da Nang planning, see the Hoi An day trips guide . If you want the whole town mapped into days, start with the main Hoi An guide or the 3-day itinerary .
Book a Hoi An cooking class , a basket boat tour in Cam Thanh , or a My Son sunrise tour ahead of time in high season. For the official record on the two UNESCO sites and the visa rules mentioned above, see UNESCO on Hoi An Ancient Town , UNESCO on My Son Sanctuary , and the Vietnam e-visa portal .
Pick 4 or 5 from this list rather than all 12 in one visit. Hoi An’s whole appeal is a slow morning at a craft village or a market, not a checklist sprint.