Hue’s heritage attractions have recorded strong changes in both scale and visitor mix. The Hue monuments system reported more than 3.16 million visits and over VND473 billion in ticket revenue in 2025, while earlier records show how international markets, holiday periods, and digital ticketing have shaped demand.
Contents
- Annual visitation and ticket revenue
- Domestic and international visitors
- Peak periods and holiday demand
- Electronic ticketing and visitor programmes
- Museums and related heritage attractions
- Historical baseline and official outlook
Annual visitation and ticket revenue
The latest annual figures in the supplied reporting are for 2025. The Hue Monuments Conservation Centre recorded more than 3.16 million visits during the year. The Trung tâm Bảo tồn Di tích Cố đô Huế 2025 report states that visitation increased 14.2% from 2024.
Ticket revenue also exceeded VND473 billion in 2025. That was more than VND51 billion higher than the previous year, and the result reached 110% of the state-assigned plan. These figures refer to ticket revenue from Hue monument visitation, not all tourism spending in Hue or Central Vietnam.
For comparison, the Vietnam Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism report on 2024 heritage visitation recorded 2.77 million visits to Hue monuments in 2024. The report said visitation was more than 19.14% higher than in 2023. Ticket revenue exceeded VND422 billion, rose more than 18.6% year over year, and reached 132% of the assigned plan.
| Measurement | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|
| Hue monument visits | 2.77 million | More than 3.16 million |
| Ticket revenue | More than VND422 billion | More than VND473 billion |
| Reported year-over-year change | More than 19.14% | 14.2% from 2024 |
| Plan result | 132% of assigned plan | 110% of state-assigned plan |
The annual totals should be read with their measurement labels intact: the 2024 and 2025 figures concern Hue monuments, while other figures below concern the wider province, individual programmes, museums, or shorter holiday windows.
An earlier benchmark comes from 2017. The Vietnam Government Committee for Religious Affairs report on the Hue imperial relic site said the site served more than 3 million visitors and earned more than VND320 billion. Revenue was 22.05% above plan. Because this is a legacy year and a differently described reporting scope, it is best treated as a historical reference rather than a direct substitute for the later monument totals.
Domestic and international visitors
The 2024 monument total included more than 1.26 million international visits and more than 1.51 million domestic visits, according to the Vietnam Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism. Those two reported groups show a substantial split between overseas and Vietnamese demand, but the supplied figures are rounded and should not be recombined into a more precise total.
The 2017 source provides a more detailed view of international source markets at the Hue imperial relic site. South Korean visitors numbered 207,783 and represented 25.5% of site visitors. France represented 9.6%, the United Kingdom 6.2%, the United States 5.9%, and Germany 4.1%. These percentages describe the 2017 site visitor mix, not the later 2024 or 2025 visitor composition.
The VietnamPlus report on Thua Thien-Hue tourism reported more than 1.8 million foreigners visiting the UNESCO world heritage site in 2017. The same report said the Hue Monuments Conservation Centre recorded 320,000 visitors in January 2018, including 262,000 foreigners. January 2018 visitation was up 30% from January 2017.
The scale of international demand was also visible during the 2018 calendar New Year holiday. More than 35,000 visitors came to Hue, with 80% from foreign countries. This is a holiday figure for Hue rather than an annual count for the monuments system.
Peak periods and holiday demand
Short holiday windows can produce very different visitor patterns from annual totals. During 30 December 2017 to 1 January 2018, the Hue imperial relic site welcomed nearly 31,000 tourists. Foreigners made up 80% of visitors in that period, according to the Hue imperial relic site report.
The first day of the 2019 Tet holiday, 5 February 2019, brought 25,000 visitors to the Complex of Hue Monuments. Foreigners accounted for 170 of those visitors. Across Hue city, the estimate for the 31 January–11 February 2019 Tet period was 230,000 travellers, including about 70,800 foreigners. Province-wide tourism revenue for that holiday was estimated at VND140 billion. These estimates cover the holiday and wider tourism activity, so they are not equivalent to monument ticket revenue.
The 2024 Tet figures show a different composition. Hue heritage sites received 104,682 visits during 10–12 February 2024. International visitors accounted for 12,235 visits, while domestic visitors made more than 92,400 visits. The Bao Van Hoa report identifies these as three-day heritage-site visitation figures.
Another comparison comes from the 29 April–1 May holiday period. Hue heritage sites received more than 54,000 visitors over the three days in 2023, and the count for 1 May alone was 24,313 ticketed visitors. The comparable three-day holiday total in 2022 was 27,063 heritage-site visitors. The Hue electronic-ticketing report provides these period-specific counts.
Electronic ticketing and visitor programmes
Electronic ticketing operated at four high-volume heritage sites: the Imperial City, Tu Duc Tomb, Minh Mang Tomb, and Khai Dinh Tomb. The operating period reported by the Hue source was November 2022 through 15 May 2023.
By 15 May 2023, the electronic ticket system had recorded 915,911 heritage-site ticket buyers. International ticket buyers numbered 449,328, while domestic ticket buyers numbered 466,583. These are electronic-system records through a stated date, not a full-year visitation total.
The same historical reporting shows the scale of programme-specific demand. Dai Noi by night served 28,000 tourists in 2017 and generated more than VND3 billion. Services offered at the Hue imperial relic site earned more than VND16 billion that year. The 2017 relic-site report gives these programme and service figures.
Together, the electronic-ticketing and programme numbers distinguish several types of measurement: people buying through a particular system, people attending a named programme, and people counted across the monument site. A system total through 15 May, a holiday count over three days, and an annual visitor total should not be treated as interchangeable.
Museums and related heritage attractions
The Ho Chi Minh Museum and its memorial sites in Hue recorded 128,375 visits in 2024. The Ho Chi Minh Museum in Hue report also lists several activity measures for that year.
The museum recorded 1,018 flower-reporting groups, 228 youth-admission groups, 130 documentary-film groups, and 105 extracurricular-activity groups. Five thematic exhibitions received more than 25,000 visitors. These are museum-specific or activity-specific records and should be kept separate from the Complex of Hue Monuments totals.
The counts show why a Hue heritage visit can be measured at more than one level. A visitor total may cover a museum, a memorial site, a tomb, the Imperial City, or a broader monument system. Group counts and exhibition attendance describe participation in activities, not necessarily unique people across all attractions.
Historical baseline and official outlook
The UNESCO Management Plan of the Complex of Hue Monuments for 2015–2020, Vision 2030 provides earlier baseline figures. Thua Thien Hue received 2.6 million tourists in 2013, while Hue relics received 2.1 million visitors. Hue relic entrance-ticket sales reached VND126 billion in 2013.
In 2014, the province received approximately 3 million tourists, including 1.3 million international tourists. The average length of stay in Hue was about two days per person. The Hue Monuments Conservation Centre welcomed nearly 1 million foreign visitors and more than 1 million domestic visitors in that year.
Festival demand formed a noticeable part of the 2014 record. The 2014 Hue Festival, held from 12–20 April, drew about 200,000 visitors to the Complex of Hue Monuments, including about 100,000 international visitors.
The same UNESCO document includes a 2030 official tourism forecast for Thua Thien Hue: 12 million tourists, of whom 5 million were forecast to be foreign tourists. This is a plan forecast, not an observed visitation result. It should therefore be read as a stated planning target rather than evidence that the number has already been reached.
An earlier provincial outlook also illustrates the difference between observed counts and targets. For 2018, Thua Thien-Hue’s tourism target was 4–4.2 million visitors, with a tourism revenue target of VND4–4.2 trillion and a projected 15% increase, as reported by VietnamPlus. The target concerned provincial tourism, not only ticketed visits to Hue heritage sites.
For travellers planning a Central Vietnam itinerary, the most useful interpretation is to match each number to its scope and date: annual monument visits for overall scale, source-market shares for visitor composition, holiday counts for peak pressure, electronic-ticket records for system coverage, and forecasts for planning context.