The best international schools in Hanoi, 2026

How we rank

The 2026 Hanoi ranking weights five factors. The first is academic outcome at the end of secondary, measured by Diploma scores, A Level grade profile, AP examination results and university destinations across the past three cohorts. The second is faculty stability and qualifications. Schools that retain experienced staff produce more consistent outcomes than those that rebuild every two or three years, and Hanoi has both kinds. The third is accreditation and curriculum authorisation, with IB World School status, CIS membership and Cambridge International School authorisation treated as meaningful evidence of process maturity. The fourth is parent satisfaction from our verified review database, weighted toward families who have completed at least two full school years. The fifth is physical infrastructure, including campus space, sports facilities, science laboratories and the quality of the early years setting.

We do not weight fees in the ranking. They are treated separately in the fees section below. A school sitting outside our top 10 may still be the right fit for specific children, particularly where a bilingual programme or a national-cohort connection matters. This is a starting list, not a verdict.

One observation that shapes the Hanoi ranking specifically. The city's school market has matured at speed since the late 2010s, with several new entrants either opening fresh campuses or upgrading their secondary provision in the past four to five years. That makes the historical record useful but incomplete. Where a school has been running its Diploma or A Level programme for less than three years we have leaned more heavily on faculty, curriculum authorisation and infrastructure than on outcomes, since the outcomes record is still being written. Families weighing those schools should make their own judgement on the trajectory.

One more nuance. Several Hanoi schools share parent companies with much larger international networks. Nord Anglia (BIS Hanoi), International Schools Partnership and a handful of bilingual groups operate across multiple cities. The network connection cuts both ways. The shared services and central support raise the floor of what each school can deliver. But the network can also produce a corporate feel that some families find sits awkwardly against the more independent or community-rooted alternatives. The ranking reflects what we observe on the ground rather than the branding.

The 2026 top 10

What did not make the top 10

Several Hanoi schools sit just outside the top 10 but warrant tour visits depending on your circumstances. Olympia Schools for high-quality bilingual Cambridge primary at materially below international fees. Vinschool for the most established Vietnamese national-curriculum network with an English-medium International stream that is growing quickly. Genesis School for an emerging bilingual IB candidate school. Maple Bear Canadian Pre-School for early years if you are starting from kindergarten and want a Canadian-curriculum primary feeder. Australian International School Vietnam for HSC and Cambridge pathways. Sentia International School for an IB candidate primary in central Hanoi.

The Hanoi school market is changing more quickly than most. Several of the schools above were not on this list five years ago and several of next year's likely top-ten entrants are still in candidate phase today. Families on a five year horizon should check authorisation status as well as historical outcomes.

Worth flagging too: a small number of Hanoi schools have struggled with quality assurance in the past five years, with leadership churn and parent complaints that show up consistently in our review database. We have left these out of the top ten and out of the honourable mentions. Hanoi families with longer experience in the city know which schools we mean and we are happy to share the list directly when families ask through the contact form. Public naming on a quality concern requires a higher evidentiary bar than the format of a top-ten article supports.

Fees and the all-in number

Hanoi Tier 1 tuition runs USD 22,000 to USD 38,000 for the 2026 to 2027 academic year at the most senior year groups. Tier 2 sits in the USD 12,000 to USD 22,000 band. Tier 3 and the bilingual schools cover USD 6,000 to USD 14,000. Add 18 to 25 percent for capital levies, transport, books, lunches and trips, and the all-in number is roughly USD 27,000 to USD 47,000 per child per year at the top and USD 8,000 to USD 18,000 at the bilingual tier. Materially below Bangkok premium and around half of Singapore Tier 1 for comparable academic outcomes at the top end. See our hidden fees article for the structural picture and the Hanoi fees deep dive for the city-specific numbers.

Two specific Hanoi fee structures are worth flagging. Several schools (Concordia, BIS Hanoi, UNIS Hanoi) charge meaningful one-time enrolment fees of USD 3,000 to USD 6,000 per child. School bus is usually USD 1,500 to USD 2,500 per year and is required for most families given the city's traffic patterns. Lunches run USD 1,000 to USD 1,800. iPads and laptop programmes from Year 5 add a further USD 500 to USD 1,200. Most premium-tier families end up paying USD 5,000 to USD 8,000 in non-tuition costs on top of the headline fee.

Fee inflation in Hanoi has been faster than wage inflation across the past five years, although the absolute starting point was lower than most peer cities. Annual fee increases of 5 to 8 percent are typical at the premium tier and 4 to 6 percent at the bilingual tier. Some employer packages cover only base tuition, leaving families to pay extras out of pocket, which can lead to surprise costs of USD 4,000 to USD 7,000 per child in the first year. Families on global packages should clarify in writing what the employer covers before signing the school contract and should ask schools to quote the full all-in number rather than the headline tuition figure. The sibling discount round-up covers which Hanoi schools soften the bill for second and third children.

Scholarship provision in Hanoi is more limited than in Singapore or Hong Kong but is genuinely present. UNIS Hanoi runs a small need-blind scholarship programme. BIS Hanoi has Nord Anglia network scholarships for music, sport and academic excellence at Year 7 and Year 12. Concordia operates a partial-tuition scholarship pool. Hanoi schools generally fund scholarships from internal endowment rather than parent levies, which keeps the funding modest by international standards but the awards meaningful for the families who receive them. Apply 12 months out and treat the scholarship as a parallel application rather than a tacked-on request.

Neighbourhoods that match these schools

The Hanoi family neighbourhood map is shorter than Bangkok or Ho Chi Minh City but worth understanding before signing a school contract. For families optimising school commute alongside housing:

• Tay Ho and West Lake: UNIS Hanoi, ISV. The default expat-family neighbourhood with lake views, cafes, supermarkets and walkable streets. Most popular Tier 1 hire location and the area where most newcomers spend the first month while they orient themselves.
• Ciputra: UNIS Hanoi, ISV, Singapore International. The contained gated-compound option, suburban feel inside the city. Especially popular with Korean, Japanese and Singaporean families and with families who value security and predictability above urban exposure.
• Long Bien and Vinhomes Riverside: Concordia, BIS Hanoi, Lycée Français, Wellspring. The newer family compound option across the Red River, with the largest schools in the city. Trade-off is the commute back to the city centre, which can run 45 minutes each way in heavy traffic.
• Ba Dinh and old quarter fringe: HIS, St Paul American. Closer to the diplomatic enclave and downtown. Smaller schools and a more urban Hanoi family experience. Rental stock is older and more variable than in the gated compounds but the daily life is richer.
• Gamuda Gardens: Singapore International School. South Hanoi gated community with growing expat density and the Singapore primary feeder. Quieter than Tay Ho with significant green space.

A practical rule for families newly arrived in Hanoi: choose the school first and the neighbourhood second, but visit both before signing either. Several Tier 1 hires have ended up with a school they like and a neighbourhood that does not suit family life, or vice versa. The 45 minute morning commute that looks acceptable on paper at sign-up becomes a daily grind by the second term. Spend a long weekend driving the school run at typical rush hour before committing.

Admissions timing and entry points

Hanoi is broadly more flexible than the most pressed Asian markets. Most schools accept applications on a rolling basis and can place children with three to six months of notice for non-peak year groups. UNIS Hanoi, Concordia and BIS Hanoi can run waitlists of nine to twelve months at the most-pressed entry points (Reception, Year 7 and the Diploma), so for these schools applying nine to twelve months ahead of intended start date is sensible. For the other premium schools, four to six months is usually sufficient. For the bilingual and mid-tier schools, three months is normally enough, although applying earlier widens your campus choice.

Assessment processes at the top schools combine a written entry task in the language of instruction, an interview and a review of prior school reports. Cambridge schools sometimes also use a CAT4 cognitive screen. Most schools want to see at least two years of recent school reports and a teacher reference. Families relocating mid-year are usually accommodated; UNIS Hanoi and Concordia regularly take January, March or May arrivals. Read our broader admissions timing guide.

One quirk worth knowing about. The Hanoi academic year structure varies more than in most cities. Some schools follow a northern-hemisphere August to June timetable; others run a slightly compressed September to May calendar; the bilingual schools sometimes hold a September entry only with no mid-year flexibility. When the Diploma examinations sit in May, the timetable squeeze at some smaller schools is real and families arriving in January should expect a working level of Diploma teaching to have started already. The simplest way to navigate this is to ask the admissions office directly for the academic calendar at point of application rather than assume it matches your previous school.

The waitlist conversations are usually genuine rather than ceremonial. UNIS Hanoi and Concordia maintain real waiting lists with movement that depends on departures from current cohorts. Schools tend to notify waitlist families three to six weeks before the relevant entry date with movement that is hard to predict in advance. Families who want certainty should accept a Plan B offer and trade up if the first choice opens later. Premium schools are usually willing to refund deposits inside a published cancellation window, although the windows are tight enough that families need to read the contract carefully.

A note on cohort size and depth

One structural feature of the Hanoi school market matters more than families usually expect: the cohort sizes are small. Even the largest premium schools enrol four to six hundred upper secondary students, against the one to two thousand at the equivalent Bangkok or Singapore schools. At Diploma level the cohort is sometimes only sixty to a hundred candidates. That has real consequences for subject choice, for the depth of the IB or A Level options on offer, and for the pace of co-curricular development. Most Hanoi schools cover the core subjects well but cannot always timetable the rarer HL or Further Maths options that a larger school takes for granted.

The flip side of small cohorts is genuinely high faculty visibility. Senior leaders at Hanoi schools usually know the students by name. Form tutor relationships are tighter. The pastoral programmes feel less industrial. For some families this is a strong positive; for others, particularly families with academically specialised children, it can be a constraint. The right answer depends on the individual child rather than a general preference.

How to choose for your family

The right Hanoi school comes down to three structural variables. The first is the curriculum trajectory you want at the end of secondary. If you expect a US university pathway, Concordia or St Paul American probably make the strongest shortlist. If you expect a UK pathway, BIS Hanoi is the structural anchor with HIS as the smaller alternative. If you want the IB Diploma as a portable qualification, UNIS Hanoi sits alone at the top with Concordia (which runs IB alongside AP) as the credible second choice and HIS as the smaller third option. If you expect a French or European trajectory, Lycée Français Alexandre Yersin is the obvious choice and one of the better value Tier 1 options.

The second variable is where you will live. The Long Bien schools (Concordia, BIS Hanoi, Lycée Français) make most sense if you live in Vinhomes Riverside or Long Bien more broadly. UNIS Hanoi and ISV serve the Tay Ho and Ciputra catchment. HIS and St Paul American work best for families in the central districts. Hanoi traffic is heavy enough that adding 30 minutes to the school run each way can change family life materially.

The third variable is cohort size and feel. UNIS Hanoi, Concordia and BIS Hanoi are large schools with the scale advantages and the institutional feel that comes with that. HIS, Singapore International, ISV and Lycée Français are smaller and more intimate, with stronger pastoral familiarity but narrower co-curricular and Diploma subject choice. There is no right answer here. Some children thrive in the bigger setting; others find a smaller school easier to settle into and stronger in delivering individual attention.

Whatever the right answer for your family, build the shortlist early, visit in person and treat the school choice as the constraint that drives the housing decision rather than the other way around. Hanoi rewards families who do this. For broader relocation context see our companion guides at moving to Hanoi with kids and cheapest international schools in Hanoi. For curriculum theory see the IB and British hubs. The Hanoi city guide covers the wider city picture.

One last consideration worth raising. The Hanoi expat community is smaller and tighter than Bangkok, Singapore or Hong Kong. Word about specific schools travels fast and is usually more reliable than the marketing material. If you are at the shortlist stage and you can find two or three families with children currently at the schools you are considering, the half hour conversation each will give you will be among the most valuable inputs to the decision. Most expat associations, the international parent groups and our own contact form can connect you with current families willing to talk through the experience honestly. The schools themselves will arrange parent conversations on request and the good ones are usually willing to put you in touch with parents whose children are typical of the cohort rather than handpicked.

Families completing the decision should also factor in the secondary signals. How responsive is the admissions office. How professional are the school reports. Does the school publish its Diploma or A Level results openly. How does the parent body talk about school leadership. None of these is decisive on its own. Taken together they paint a picture that the brochure and the campus tour will not. Hanoi's better schools are confident on all of these points. Where a school cannot or will not answer them clearly, that itself is information.

The final point worth making is that the Hanoi market rewards patience. The best entry windows for the most pressed schools are not necessarily the obvious ones. Families that are willing to consider a January or April start often find space at schools that were closed for August entry. Families willing to accept a one-year Plan B school and trade up later sometimes end up at their preferred school with less stress than those who hold out for the perfect August start. Hanoi is not Singapore. The market has slack. Families who use the slack tend to do better than those who insist on the straight line.

Related guides

• International school fees in Hanoi
• Moving to Hanoi with kids
• IB schools in Hanoi: the complete list