Vietnam's beverage chain market topped 1.3 billion dollars in 2026. According to a report released by the Singapore venture capital firm Momentum Works, the coffee chain segment was 725 million dollars (up 27% year on year) and the tea chain segment was 617 million dollars (up 28%), the third-largest market in Southeast Asia as a whole after Indonesia and Thailand.
Vietnam's largest coffee chain is Milano Coffee
The only coffee chain with over 1,000 stores within Vietnam is Milano Coffee. With about 2,500 stores nationwide, it has an overwhelming presence across Southeast Asia as a whole. Among 11 chains with over 1,000 stores in Southeast Asia, the fact that Milano Coffee is the only one exceeding that level in Vietnam alone speaks to the deep-rootedness of Vietnam's coffee culture.
2位はハイランズコーヒー（ベトナム国内 約947店、フィリピン含め世界985店）。フィリピンの外食大手ジョリビー・フーズが親会社で、IPOを視野に入れた拡張フェーズに入っている。
| Chain | Number of locations | Characteristics |
|---|---|---|
| Milano Coffee | About 2,500 | The largest local chain |
| Highlands Coffee | 947（国内）/985（世界） | Under Jollibee, preparing for an IPO |
| ToCoToCo | About 1,000 | The largest tea chain |
| Phuc Long | Several hundred | Specialty-oriented |
| Starbucks | Over 100 | Foreign premium |
A café experience guide for travelers
The experience of drinking coffee in Vietnam is one of the real joys of sightseeing. Showing a completely different face by region is a feature of Vietnamese coffee culture.
Café culture in Hanoi (the north)
Cafés renovated from old buildings are dotted about the alleys. The café district along the railway, "Train Street," has become a world-famous tourist spot. A "café culture" of sitting slowly and passing the time is deep-rooted, a space where interaction with locals easily arises.
The specialty is egg coffee (Ca Phe Trung). A sweet drink with cream whipped from raw egg yolk and condensed milk placed atop the coffee, it boasts immense popularity as a cultural experience unique to Hanoi.
Café culture in Ho Chi Minh City (the south)
Stylish cafés are surging. New business models like coworking x café are also increasing, popular with young people and foreigners. Rooftop terraces of buildings and cafés renovated from former factory sites function as "photogenic spots."
Ho Chi Minh City's specialty is iced milk coffee (Ca Phe Sua Da). A combination of condensed milk and Robusta coffee, it's marked by being sweet and strong.
Three points for enjoying Vietnamese coffee while traveling
1. Choose a local chain
Starbucks has several stores in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi, but prices are on par with Japan. Choosing local chains like Highlands Coffee or Phuc Long, you can enjoy it for a couple hundred yen while feeling the local atmosphere.
2. Experience drip coffee (phin)
Coffee brewed with Vietnam's drip tool, the "phin," is a popular experience with tourists. Order it at a local café and there's the fun of dripping it yourself, with the wait time part of the experience too.
3. The set culture with banh mi
Ordering banh mi (a Vietnamese sandwich) at a café is the local breakfast culture. The set price of coffee + banh mi is about 200 to 300 yen. It's the best value as breakfast while traveling.
The market's future: from a chain war to greater efficiency
What the Momentum Works report points out is a shift in the competitive axis toward "operational efficiency and supply-chain optimization" rather than rapid store expansion. As existing chains enter a phase of focusing on quality improvement, Vietnam's coffee scene is seen as maturing further.
For travelers, as the chains compete on quality improvement, they can enjoy the benefit of a higher experiential value of coffee. A Vietnam trip in 2026 looks set to be one of the periods when the coffee scene is most rich.
For those who want to enjoy Vietnamese coffee at home, we've prepared a drip coffee gift set imported directly from Vietnam.
