Phu Quốc

⚠️ Entry rules and local regulations change without notice. Before booking, check entry requirements and local rules — visas, access, nature reserves, visitor quotas — with the official authorities.

Phu Quốc is Vietnam's largest island, tucked into the Gulf of Thailand off the Cambodian coast. Nicknamed the "pearl island", it charms visitors with white sand beaches such as Bai Sao and Bai Dai, turquoise waters ideal for diving and snorkelling around the An Thoi archipelago, and a national park recognised as a UNESCO biosphere reserve covering more than half the island. Phu Quốc is also known for its traditional nuoc-mâm (fish sauce), pepper plantations, the lively Duong Dong night market and the Hon Thom cable car, one of the longest three-rope cable cars in the world stretching out over the sea.

Vietnam's island, off the coast of Cambodia

Phu Quoc is Vietnam's largest island — 575 km², about the size of Singapore — lying in the Gulf of Thailand closer to the Cambodian coast than to the Vietnamese mainland, which Cambodia has never quite forgotten. For most of its history it was a place of fishing villages, pepper farms and fish-sauce factories; its nuoc mam is still considered the best in the country and has a protected designation. The northern half is a national park of dense rainforest, part of a UNESCO biosphere reserve.

In the last fifteen years it has been transformed by an explicit government decision to make it Vietnam's resort island: an international airport, a highway, casinos, and a chain of enormous resort complexes along the west and south coasts — Sun World's cable car to Hon Thom, at almost eight kilometres the longest over sea in the world, and a theme park styled as a Mediterranean town. Long Beach (Bai Truong), the west-coast strip, is where most of this sits.

The older Phu Quoc survives in the north and east: Sao Beach and Khem Beach in the south-east with their white sand, the fishing village of Ham Ninh on stilts, the pepper plantations inland, the night market of Duong Dong, and the An Thoi islands off the southern tip for snorkelling. The Coconut Tree Prison, where the South Vietnamese held tens of thousands of Viet Cong prisoners, is the island's darker monument.

November to April, the dry season

The dry season from November to April is the time: 27–32 °C, calm sea on the west coast, sunshine most days. December to February is peak season and the most expensive. The south-west monsoon brings rain from May to October, heaviest in July–September, when the west-coast beaches are rough and the east coast sheltered — the island stays open, at lower prices, with afternoon storms rather than all-day rain.

Visa-free for most Europeans, and a scooter

⚠️ French citizens and nationals of most — not all — EU countries may enter Vietnam without a visa for up to 45 days; others need the e-visa, applied for online. Phu Quoc itself has a separate 30-day visa-free regime for all nationalities arriving directly on the island and staying on it, which the resorts rely on. Direct flights arrive from Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi and a growing list of Asian cities; from Europe count a connection in Vietnam, the Gulf or Bangkok.

The currency is the dong; cards are accepted in the resorts, cash is needed in the villages. A scooter is the island's transport, hired everywhere for a few dollars a day — drive carefully, the roads are fast and the helmet rule is enforced. Eat the seafood at Ham Ninh and the night market, the pepper in everything, the local fish sauce, and the bun quay noodle soup; the island's sim wine, from the rose myrtle berry, is the souvenir.

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