Apostille for Vietnam from 11 September 2026: What Changes
Updated: 2026-11-05 · GRZAN Regulatory Team · Verification date 2026-10-20
This is a living page: the list of Contracting Parties and Vietnam’s competent authority arrangements change with official announcements, so rely on the version current at the time.
Q: Do Vietnamese registration documents need consular legalisation?
A: It depends on the issuing country. The Apostille Convention has applied to Vietnam since 11 September 2026:
- Public documents issued in Contracting States require only an Apostille; consular legalisation is no longer required;
- Public documents issued in non-Contracting States still require consular legalisation (for example Germany, Austria and Czechia, which do not yet apply the Convention under the relevant transitional arrangements);
- On either route, a notarised Vietnamese translation remains mandatory.
Q: What does this mean for Chinese manufacturers?
A: It means the form of the authentication chain must be reassessed. China is a Contracting State, so Chinese public documents used in Vietnam should take the Apostille route (an Apostille issued by the Chinese competent authority) rather than the previous two-step process of “authentication by the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs plus authentication by the Vietnamese embassy or consulate in China”. This change shortens the chain and reduces time and cost, but two steps remain: (1) confirm that the specific document falls within the “public document” category covered by the Convention; (2) complete a notarised Vietnamese translation.
Q: Which documents need the authentication chain?
A: Typically legal documents executed abroad, including the LoA, the CFS, the manufacturer’s incorporation or legal status documents, the ISO 13485 certificate (where required), and some supporting declarations. Authentication requirements for technical evidence (test reports, clinical reports and similar) are more flexible and follow current MOH guidance.
Q: How should Vietnamese translation be handled?
A: A notarised Vietnamese translation must be issued by a qualified translation or notarisation body in Vietnam. In practice, machine translations are not accepted in review — one of the clear red lines in Vietnamese filings. Technical documents may be submitted in English, but labelling and instructions for use must have Vietnamese versions.
Q: Where do filings most often go wrong?
A: Two places. (1) The order of authentication and translation — complete the authentication chain first, then translate (or arrange notarisation of the translation as required); reversing the order leads to rejection. (2) Consistency of content — the model numbers and names on the authenticated LoA, the CSDT and the labelling must match exactly; a single mismatch wastes the entire chain.
Practical note: treat the authentication chain as a separate critical path on the Gantt chart and allow a buffer of at least 30%. Experience shows it is the most under-estimated, least compressible and most costly-to-get-wrong segment of a Vietnamese project: a mistake means redoing not one document but the whole chain.
Verification checklist (26 October 2026): (1) the date the Apostille Convention took effect for Vietnam, 11 September 2026, and the list of Contracting Parties (as published by the Hague Conference on Private International Law at the time); (2) Vietnam’s announcement on its Apostille competent authority and procedure; (3) the Chinese authority competent to issue Apostilles and its procedure; (4) dossier document requirements under Decree 98/2021/NĐ-CP; (5) Circular 44/2025/TT-BYT (LoA template).
Disclaimer
Prepared by GRZAN from publicly available regulation. It is provided for general information only and does not constitute legal advice. Legislation and official fees are subject to change by the competent authority.
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