Is it legal in Vietnam? Drug law, penalties and sources

What governs drugs in Vietnam

Drug offences sit in chapter XX of the Criminal Code, Bộ luật Hình sự số 100/2015/QH13, at articles 247 to 259. The chapter separates the conduct rather than the substance. Article 247 is growing the plant, article 248 is unlawful production, article 249 is unlawful possession, article 250 is unlawful transport, article 251 is unlawful trading, and article 252 is appropriation. Which article you are charged under decides the maximum, and the quantity decides the band inside it.

That matters more here than in most countries, because the English word trafficking covers two separate Vietnamese offences. Vận chuyển at article 250 is carrying. Mua bán at article 251 is buying and selling. They now have different ceilings, so an account that says trafficking without saying which one is no longer usable.

The code was amended by Luật số 12/2017/QH14, by Luật số 59/2024/QH15, and on 25 June 2025 by Luật số 86/2025/QH15, which came into force on 1 July 2025.

What changed on 1 July 2025

Before that date, articles 248, 250 and 251 each ended the same way. In the text as enacted in 2015 the top band of all three reads 'Phạm tội thuộc một trong các trường hợp sau đây, thì bị phạt tù 20 năm, tù chung thân hoặc tử hình', in translation that committing the offence in one of the following cases is punished with twenty years of imprisonment, life imprisonment or death.

Luật số 86/2025/QH15 replaced all five articles. Article 250 now ends at khoản 4, which reads 'Phạm tội thuộc một trong các trường hợp sau đây, thì bị phạt tù 20 năm hoặc tù chung thân', in translation that it is punished with twenty years of imprisonment or life imprisonment. The words hoặc tử hình are gone and nothing replaced them. Carrying drugs in Vietnam is no longer a capital offence.

Article 249, unlawful possession, never carried it. Its top band was fifteen to twenty years or life imprisonment in 2015 and it is fifteen to twenty years or life imprisonment now. Article 252, appropriation, is the same.

Which articles still carry a death sentence

Two. Article 248, unlawful production, and article 251, unlawful trading. In both, the amendment moved the death penalty up rather than out: it inserted a new khoản 4 of twenty years or life, and pushed the capital band into a new khoản 5 which reads 'Phạm tội thuộc một trong các trường hợp sau đây, thì bị phạt tù chung thân hoặc tử hình', in translation that it is punished with life imprisonment or death.

The quantity that reaches that band rose sharply. In 2015 the capital band of articles 248 and 251 began at five kilograms of opium resin, cannabis resin or coca paste, or one hundred grams of the named drugs. Khoản 5 now begins at thirty kilograms of the resins, which is six times the old figure, and three kilograms of the named drugs, which is thirty times the old figure.

The list of named drugs also grew. The 2015 text named 'Hêrôin, côcain, Methamphetamine, Amphetamine, MDMA'. The current text names 'Heroine, Cocaine, Methamphetamine, Amphetamine, Ketamine, Fentanyl, MDMA hoặc XLR-11'. Ketamine, fentanyl and the synthetic cannabinoid XLR-11 were added by name, so for those three the amendment made the exposure sharper and not softer.

And no scheduled substance is categorically outside the capital band. Khoản 5 of both articles closes with catch-alls: 'Các chất ma túy khác ở thể rắn có khối lượng 09 kilôgam trở lên' and 'Các chất ma túy khác ở thể lỏng có thể tích 22 lít trở lên', in translation that other narcotic substances in solid form from nine kilograms, and in liquid form from twenty two litres, reach the same band.

The sentences that had already been passed

Article 3(2) of the amending law deals with people who were already under sentence of death. It reads 'Hình phạt tử hình đã tuyên trước ngày 01 tháng 7 năm 2025 đối với người phạm tội về các tội quy định tại các điều 109, 110, 114, 194, 250, 353, 354 và 421 của Bộ luật Hình sự ... mà chưa thi hành án thì không thi hành và Chánh án Tòa án nhân dân tối cao quyết định chuyển hình phạt tử hình thành tù chung thân', in translation that a death sentence passed before 1 July 2025 for an offence under those articles, including article 250, which has not been carried out is not to be carried out, and the Chief Justice of the Supreme People's Court decides to convert it to life imprisonment.

That sentence is also the proof that article 250 carried the death penalty before, since a clause converting such a sentence would be meaningless otherwise.

Article 3(3) goes further and reaches articles 248 and 251, where the death penalty remains. A death sentence passed before 1 July 2025 under either article is also converted to life imprisonment where the quantity found in the judgment is at or below the lowest quantity in the new khoản 5, or is above it but the person was not a ringleader, organiser or commander and had fewer than two aggravating circumstances. Article 3(6)(a) puts the Supreme People's Court in charge of identifying who qualifies.

The same amendment created a new offence of using drugs

Article 1(20) of Luật số 86/2025/QH15 inserted article 256a, tội sử dụng trái phép chất ma túy, the crime of unlawfully using a narcotic substance. It carries two to three years of imprisonment for a person who uses while in a period of compulsory treatment, post treatment supervision or monitoring under the Law on Drug Prevention and Control, and three to five years on repetition.

So the same statute that removed the death penalty from carrying drugs added a prison offence for consuming them. An account of 1 July 2025 that reports only the first half describes a liberalisation that did not happen in one direction only.

What this page does not say

It does not say which substances are scheduled. Articles 248 to 252 punish conduct in relation to chất ma túy, and the list of those substances is set by government decree, in the code's own words do Chính phủ quy định. No such decree has been cached for this page, so the only substances named here are the ones the articles name in their own text.

For any other substance the penalty is reached through the code's residual categories, other narcotic substances in solid or liquid form, and the page says so rather than asserting a schedule it has not read.

Penalties by article of the Criminal Code

Every substance confirmed against a primary source

84 substances have a status for Vietnam verified against a named statute. Each row links to the full entry, with the consequences, the prescription position and the source.

Not separately listed

Sources

• Luật số 86/2025/QH15, sửa đổi, bổ sung một số điều của Bộ luật Hình sự, 25 June 2025, in force 1 July 2025 The signed original as published by the Government Office, 48 pages, an image only scan with no text layer. Optically recognised with the Vietnamese model, and every penalty clause quoted here was read again from the rendered page image.
• Bộ luật Hình sự, văn bản hợp nhất 135/VBHN-VPQH, consolidating Luật số 100/2015/QH13 with Luật số 12/2017/QH14, Luật số 59/2024/QH15 and Luật số 86/2025/QH15 Published by the Office of the National Assembly with a text layer, so it is an independently typed copy rather than a second reading of the same scan. Its numbered footnotes are what establish which amendment touched which article.
• Bộ luật Hình sự số 100/2015/QH13 as enacted, Công báo 1263+1264, 1265+1266, 1267+1268 and 1269+1270 of 31 December 2015 The official gazette. Cited only for the position before 1 July 2025. Articles 248, 250 and 251 were not amended between enactment and that date.
• Luật Sở hữu trí tuệ số 50/2005/QH11, art. 15(2), on whether a statute is subject to copyright at all Names văn bản quy phạm pháp luật among the subject matter outside the scope of copyright protection. Read from the 2005 text as enacted. Whether that article survived the 2009, 2019 and 2022 amendments was not verified here.

Statute text on this page is quoted from the copies linked above. Last verified September 21, 2026.