Quy Nhon is the capital of Binh Dinh province in the South Central Coast region of Vietnam. It’s not a household name outside of Vietnam, so new visitors to the city might be surprised to find a pleasant city of about half a million people that has a beachfront.

It has been making the news in recent years as the next big thing in Vietnam travel. A major Australian news outlet recently ran a story about why you need to visit Vietnam’s next big beach destination now. The city has also made the press for the luxury train that runs from Danang to Quy Nhon.

News outlets have been taking liberties with how to describe Quy Nhon, such as the Maldives of Vietnam or Cancun without the crowds. It’s not remotely like any of those places, but it has some truly great beaches and stunning coastlines that dazzle on sunny days.

I visited Quy Nhon in Jan/Feb 2023, and I also visited the Phuong Mai Peninsula for the first time. This is technically part of Quy Nhon City even though it feels like another place. This peninsula is now being developed for tourism and industrial purposes.

This was my third time in Quy Nhon, and I’m still impressed with what a well-planned city it is and its future potential. On the other hand, the Phuong Mai Peninsula is making the same mistakes that so many other tourism developments in Vietnam have already made.

I was here at the end of the cool season and at the tail end of a polar vortex that was messing around with the weather in SE Asia. My photos of this trip do not do any justice to the coast, and I ended up skipping some beaches because of this.

This is my trip report for Quy Nhon, where you can see the best and worst of city development in Vietnam.