Ho Chi Minh City Book Street: a shaded break in the centre
Ho Chi Minh City Book Street is a pedestrian lane running about 100 metres alongside the Central Post Office, officially named Nguyen Van Binh Street. It is lined with around 20 bookstalls from Vietnam’s major publishers, a handful of cafes, and wooden benches down the middle, all under a canopy of trees that keeps it noticeably cooler than the streets around it. It opened in 2016 as the first dedicated book street in Vietnam, and it is free to walk into and browse.
Set your expectations before you go, though, because this is not a destination in its own right. It is small, you can walk the whole thing in a couple of minutes, and a foreign visitor is not really here to buy books, since most of them are in Vietnamese. What Saigon Book Street actually offers is a calm, green, shaded pause in the middle of the busiest sightseeing cluster in the city. Its real value is where it sits: a step from the Central Post Office and the cathedral, exactly the spot where you will want to get off the pavement and out of the sun for a while. Think of it as a pleasant twenty minutes, not an afternoon.
A short history
The lane has changed its name with almost every era of the city, and the sequence is a neat little history of Saigon in itself.
Under the French it was Hong Kong Street, a name that reflected Saigon’s role as a busy international trading port at the time. In 1897 it was renamed Cardis, following the colonial naming conventions of the day. After Vietnam gained independence it changed again, becoming Nguyen Hau Street in 1955. And in 2000 it took its current name, Nguyen Van Binh, after a respected Vietnamese Catholic intellectual known for promoting education and tolerance between faiths.
That pattern, a French name, then an independence-era name, then a modern Vietnamese one, is the same story you see written into streets all over the city, and it is worth noticing as you walk. You can read more about that era in our guide to French colonial Vietnam.
The book street itself is much newer. In 2016 the city turned the lane into Nguyen Van Binh Book Street, the first dedicated book street in Vietnam, gathering the country’s major publishers into one pedestrian space beside the post office. It was meant as a statement about the value the city places on reading, and it worked: the idea has since been copied in Hanoi, with its own Hanoi Book Street, and in other cities around the country.
What to see and do at Book Street
1. Browse the bookstalls
The stalls are the reason it is called Book Street, and there are around 20 of them, run by Vietnam’s biggest publishers like Nha Nam, Kim Dong, Alphabooks and Thai Ha. They are neatly laid out by subject, and each has its own look, which gives the lane more character than a single shop would.
Here is the honest part: the vast majority of the books are in Vietnamese. There is a modest selection of English and French titles, and some translated classics, but if you have come specifically to buy English-language books, you will find slim pickings and you will probably leave without one. That is fine. The browsing is enjoyable regardless, and the children’s books, the art books and the comics are worth a look for the illustrations alone, even if you cannot read a word of them.
2. Stationery, postcards and souvenirs
This is the part that is genuinely useful to a foreign visitor.
Alongside the books, the stalls sell nice stationery, bookmarks, prints, and postcards, and this is where Book Street earns its place on your route. Buy a postcard here, walk the few steps next door to the Central Post Office, and send it home from one of the most beautiful post offices in the world. That small combination is one of the nicest little things you can do in central Saigon, and it is the reason the two sit so well together.
3. Sit with a coffee
The best use of the street, and what it is really for.
There are a couple of cafes along the lane, with Phuong Nam Book Cafe and Ban Coffee the best known, and there are shaded benches running down the middle if you would rather sit outside. Order a Vietnamese coffee, take a seat under the trees, and you have a genuinely peaceful spot to escape the heat and the traffic for half an hour. In a city where sitting down usually means a plastic stool at the edge of a busy road, a quiet, green, car-free lane is worth more than it sounds.
4. Photos and people-watching
Book Street is a popular local photo spot, and at weekends you will see young Vietnamese in their best outfits posing among the stalls, families with children, and the occasional line of kindergarteners being walked through holding a rope.
It is a pleasant thing to witness, and part of the appeal is that the crowd here is mostly local rather than tourist. You are watching Saigoneers enjoy their own city, which is not something you get at most of the sights nearby.
5. Events and book fairs
The lane is used as an event space, and there is often something happening: author signings, book launches, small exhibitions, and storytelling sessions for children. The busiest time is around Vietnamese Book Day on 21 April, when the whole street fills with activity.
Almost all of it is in Vietnamese, so it is not something to plan your visit around. But if you happen to arrive while something is on, it adds a bit of life to the browse.
Practical tips for visiting Book Street
Opening hours
The lane itself is a public walkway and open at any hour, so you can stroll through even late at night. The shops and stalls generally run from around 8am to between 9pm and 10pm, seven days a week, and the cafes keep similar hours. If you want the stalls actually open and trading, come during the day or the early evening.
The best time to go
Early morning or late afternoon.
The tree cover keeps Book Street cooler than the streets around it, but this is still Saigon, and the middle of the day is hot. First thing in the morning is the quietest and most peaceful, and the late afternoon into early evening is pleasant as the heat drops and the lights come on. Weekday mornings are the calmest overall. Weekends are livelier, with more events and more people, but also busier and better for atmosphere than for quiet reading.
Bring some cash
The bigger bookshops take cards, but some of the smaller stalls and cafes are cash only. Carry a bit of Vietnamese dong so you are not caught out over a postcard or a coffee.
Set your expectations on size
This is worth saying plainly so you are not disappointed. Book Street is about 100 metres long, and you can walk from one end to the other in a couple of minutes. That is not a criticism, it is just what it is. Come expecting a grand literary district and you will wonder what the fuss is about. Come expecting a short, shaded, pleasant lane to browse and have a coffee, and it delivers exactly that.
Location and getting there
Where it is
Book Street runs along Nguyen Van Binh Street in District 1, directly beside the Central Post Office and a step from the Notre Dame Cathedral. It sits right in the historic centre, in the middle of the cluster of colonial landmarks that most visitors spend a morning walking around.
Getting there
You will almost certainly arrive on foot without planning to, because it is right next to the post office and the cathedral, and you pass it as you see them.
If you are coming from further out, a Grab will drop you at the entrance, since the lane itself is pedestrian-only and drivers all know it by the post office. The metro is also an easy option, with both Ben Thanh and Opera House stations on Line 1 within a short walk. But given how central it is, walking is almost always the answer.
Combine it with
This is the whole point of Book Street: it sits in the middle of the most walkable set of sights in the city, and it works best slotted in among them rather than visited alone. Everything below is within a few minutes on foot.
- Central Post Office. Literally next door. Buy a postcard on Book Street and send it from one of the most beautiful post offices anywhere.
- Notre Dame Cathedral. At the top of the lane, the red-brick cathedral that is the most famous building in the city, though it has been under restoration for some time.
- Reunification Palace. A few minutes’ walk away, the building where the war ended, with the command bunkers underneath.
- Nguyen Hue Walking Street and the People’s Committee Building. A short walk down towards the river, where the wide pedestrian boulevard meets the city’s grandest colonial facade.
- Dong Khoi Street. The elegant old colonial spine, minutes away, running from the cathedral down to the river past the grand hotels.
Is Ho Chi Minh City Book Street worth visiting?
Yes, as long as you come for the right reasons.
Do not come to buy books, because unless you read Vietnamese there is very little here for you. Do not come expecting a major attraction, because it is a hundred-metre lane you can walk in two minutes. If those are your expectations, you will leave wondering what the point was.
Come instead for a shaded coffee, a postcard to send from the post office next door, and twenty quiet minutes off the traffic, and Book Street is one of the most pleasant little stops in central Saigon. It costs nothing, it is genuinely lovely, and it sits right between two things you are already going to see. As a destination in its own right, it is not worth a special trip. As part of a morning around the cathedral and the post office, it is absolutely worth the five minutes it takes to walk in.
