Vietnam's Free-Tuition Reform Reshapes the Market for British Schools

A policy shift that would have seemed improbable five years ago is now fully in force across Vietnam. From the 2025 to 2026 school year, the government has abolished tuition fees for all public school students from kindergarten through to the end of secondary, benefiting more than 23 million students and costing the state an estimated 30,000 billion VND, roughly USD 1.26 billion, each year. According to a detailed expatriate guide to Vietnam's education system, the decision was validated by the Politburo in February 2025 and approved by the National Assembly in June 2025, making it one of the most significant education finance reforms in the country's modern history.

For British and other international schools in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi, the immediate practical effect on their enrolment is likely modest. Their core clientele, expatriate families and a segment of affluent Vietnamese families seeking English-medium qualifications such as IGCSEs and A Levels, are not the families choosing between a USD 25,000-a-year international school and a free state school. The two sectors operate in largely separate demand pools.

The longer-term dynamic

What the reform does change, over the medium term, is the competitive pressure on the second tier of the market. Mid-range private Vietnamese schools, many of which have been positioning themselves as affordable alternatives to international campuses, now face a stronger pull from a free and increasingly well-resourced public system. If that segment contracts, it could funnel a portion of aspirationally mobile Vietnamese families upward toward the British international tier rather than away from it.

Vietnam has also set itself a structural target: an education system meeting the standards of advanced Asian nations by 2030 and global benchmarks by 2045, with a planned split of 70 percent public to 30 percent private institutions. That ambition implicitly leaves room for a healthy private and international school market alongside a stronger public base.

What schools are watching

The British International School Ho Chi Minh City, which recently celebrated its Class of 2026 securing 183 UK university offers from a cohort of 130, sits well clear of the segment likely to be disrupted. Yet operators tracking new campus feasibility in Vietnam will need to model a public-school landscape that is now, structurally, far more attractive to local families than it was even two years ago. The free-tuition policy does not diminish the case for a British curriculum education, but it does raise the bar for any school that cannot clearly articulate what its premium buys.