The Vietnam conversion table
that converts the wrong thing
Two different tables live in the same regulation. A widely-shared document mixes them up — and the largest credential evaluator publishes four more that disagree with each other.
Quick answer: If you have found a table saying a Vietnamese mark of 9–10 is an A+ worth 3.6–4.0, or 7–7.9 is a B+ worth 2.5–3.1, those numbers are real — but they are Vietnam’s cumulative GPA classification bands, not its per-course grade conversion. Using them to convert individual course marks gives the wrong grade for most marks.
Two tables, two jobs
MOET Circular 08/2021, which governs Vietnamese university training, contains both of the following. They look similar and they are not interchangeable.
Table A — course mark to letter grade (Article 9)
Applied to each course separately, then converted to a point value under Article 10 §2.
| Mark | Letter | 4-point value |
|---|---|---|
| 8.50 – 10.0 | A | 4 |
| 7.00 – 8.49 | B | 3 |
| 5.50 – 6.99 | C | 2 |
| 4.00 – 5.49 | D | 1 |
| below 4.00 | F | 0 |
Table B — cumulative average to classification (Article 10 §5)
Applied to your overall average once, at the end. It describes academic standing, not a course grade.
| Classification | 4-point | 10-point |
|---|---|---|
| Xuất sắc — Outstanding | 3.60 – 4.00 | 9.00 – 10.0 |
| Giỏi — Very good | 3.20 – 3.59 | 8.00 – 8.99 |
| Khá — Good | 2.50 – 3.19 | 7.00 – 7.99 |
| Trung bình — Average | 2.00 – 2.49 | 5.00 – 6.99 |
| Yếu — Weak | 1.00 – 1.99 | 4.00 – 4.99 |
| Kém — Poor | below 1.00 | below 4.00 |
What the circulated table does
A grade conversion table published by EducationUSA Vietnam, headed “Grade Conversion Table for University Students According to Vietnam Ministry of Education and Training (MOET)’s Circular No. 08/2021/TT-BGDDT”, reproduces Table B — and attaches letter grades to it:
| Mark | Letter given | Value given |
|---|---|---|
| 9 – 10 | A+ | 3.6 – 4.0 |
| 8 – 8.9 | A | 3.2 – 3.5 |
| 7 – 7.9 | B+ | 2.5 – 3.1 |
| 5 – 6.9 | B | 2.0 – 2.4 |
| 4 – 4.9 | C | 1.0 – 1.9 |
| below 4 | D+ – X | 1.0 or less |
The mark ranges and point ranges match Table B exactly. The letters do not appear against those bands anywhere in the circular — the regulation assigns A, B, C, D and F to the ranges in Table A, and assigns no letters at all to the classification bands.
What that changes in practice
Converting individual course marks with the circulated table gives a different grade from the regulation for most marks:
| Your mark | Circular 08/2021 | Circulated table |
|---|---|---|
| 9.5 | A | A+ |
| 8.6 | A | A |
| 8.2 | B | A |
| 7.5 | B | B+ |
| 6.0 | C | B |
| 5.2 | D | B |
| 4.5 | D | C |
Seven of these eight marks convert differently. A mark of 5.2 is a D under the regulation and a B under the circulated table.
Is the document wrong?
Not exactly, and this matters. EducationUSA’s guidance is freely published, genuinely helpful, and the rest of it is excellent — the same document warns that direct GPA conversion is “completely inaccurate”, notes that a Vietnamese 7.5 average is likely top 10–15% of the class, and explains the red-stamp transcript process that nobody else documents.
The numbers it prints are real numbers from the real regulation. What has happened is a labelling problem: a table about overall academic standing has been presented as a per-course conversion. If you are reading your own cumulative average, the table gives the right classification. If you are converting course marks, it does not.
A second case: four WES tables that disagree
The pattern above is a labelling problem in one document. The second case is different in kind, and it matters more, because World Education Services is where Ontario universities send international transcripts for verification and where much of North America gets its Vietnamese equivalences. WES has four Vietnamese grading tables published across its own site, and they do not agree with one another.
The one that is right
The higher-education table in the WENR Vietnam country profile — published as an image, which is why it is easy to miss — is accurate, and it cites its source: “Regulation on the Use of Credit System in Higher Education, MOET, August 15th, 2007”, which is Decision 43/2007/QĐ-BGDĐT.
| WES prints | 4-point | Decision 43/2007, Điều 22 §2 and Điều 23 §1 |
|---|---|---|
| 8.5–10 | 4 (A) | A 8,5–10 → 4 ✓ |
| 7–8.4 | 3 (B) | B 7,0–8,4 → 3 ✓ |
| 5.5–6.9 | 2 (C) | C 5,5–6,9 → 2 ✓ |
| 4–5.4 | 1 (D) | D 4,0–5,4 → 1 ✓ |
| 0–4 | F (0) | F below 4,0 → 0 ✓ |
Every boundary, every letter, every point value. Three details are still loose: WES gives A the descriptor Xuất sắc/Giỏi where Điều 22 says only Giỏi (Xuất sắc is a graduation classification, not a course grade); it gives D as Yếu rather than Trung bình yếu; and its bottom row reads “0–4” where the regulation says dưới 4,0, so a mark of exactly 4.0 appears in two rows at once. Its column headings also call the 10-point and 4-point scales “old” and “new”. They are neither: Điều 22 and Điều 23 run them side by side, and Vietnamese universities print both.
The one that drops a passing grade
WES's Vietnam country-profile PDF — the file an admissions officer is far more likely to download than a PNG inside a 2017 article — carries a different higher-education table, headed “HIGHER EDUCATION GRADING SCALE AND SUGGESTED WES (U.S.) EQUIVALENT”:
| Vietnamese scale | WES grade |
|---|---|
| 8–10 | A |
| 6–7.9 | B |
| 5–5.9 | C |
| 0–4.9 | F |
There is no D. Under both Decision 43/2007 and Circular 08/2021, a course mark of 4.0 to 5.49 is a D — a loại đạt, a pass, counted in your average. On this table a 4.5 falls into the 0–4.9 row and becomes an F. A mark you passed in Vietnam is recorded as a failure. The same table also disagrees with WES's own 2017 version at every band: 8.0 is an A here and a B there.
And two secondary tables that contradict each other
For school marks, WES publishes one table in the country profile and another in its Secondary Education in Vietnam article:
| WES grade | Country profile (image) | Secondary Education article |
|---|---|---|
| A | 9–10 | 8–10 |
| B | 7–8 | 6–7.9 |
| C | 5–6 | 5–5.9 |
| F | 0–4 | 0–4.9 |
An 8.0 is an A on one WES page and a B on the other. The country-profile version is also non-contiguous: nothing is assigned to 8–9, 6–7 or 4–5, so a mark of 8.5, 6.5 or 4.5 — all perfectly ordinary — belongs to no row at all. That is the same defect as the non-contiguous secondary table in the EducationUSA document, from a different publisher.
What to do with this
The EducationUSA problem is a mislabelled table. The WES problem is vintage: several editions are live at once, and the accurate one is the least reachable. Neither organisation is careless in general, and neither is a substitute for the regulation.
Practically: if a table gives you a Vietnamese band, check where A starts. For course marks the answer is 8.50, in both the 2007 and the 2021 regulations. A table that starts A at 9.0 is either describing cumulative classification or is out of date, and either way it is not converting your course marks. If an evaluator has applied a table with no D band to a transcript of yours containing marks between 4.0 and 5.49, that is worth raising with them, with the regulation in hand.
Which table you need
- Converting course marks to build a GPA — use Table A, per course, then credit-weight. Our Vietnam calculator does exactly this.
- Reading what your overall average means — use Table B.
- Filling in a 4-point GPA on an application — check your transcript first. Vietnamese universities on the credit system calculate the official figure themselves.
How to check this yourself
Circular 08/2021/TT-BGDĐT was signed on 18 March 2021 by Deputy Minister Hoàng Minh Sơn and took effect on 3 May 2021. The record is held in the Vietnamese government’s legal document system, and the Ministry has published a draft replacement regulation in full on the Government Portal — its Articles 13 and 14 carry the same two tables, which is the easiest way to read them side by side.
Sources
Every figure on this page is read from one of the following. Where a document could not be obtained, we say so rather than filling the gap from elsewhere.
- Circular 08/2021/TT-BGDĐT — the current regulation. Signed 18 March 2021 by Deputy Minister Hoàng Minh Sơn, effective 3 May 2021. Read: the covering circular. The annexed Quy chế containing Articles 9, 10 and 14 is not in the government archive’s attachment — its bands are corroborated by the two documents below, which agree exactly.
- Decision 43/2007/QĐ-BGDĐT — the predecessor, in force 2007 to 2021 and still governing anyone who enrolled before May 2021. Signed 15 August 2007 by Deputy Minister Bành Tiến Long. Read in full. Source of the Article 22 grade bands, the Article 23 point values and the Article 3 §3 definition of a credit as 15 teaching periods.
- Draft replacement regulation (2026) — published in full on the Government Portal for public consultation, June 2026. Read in full. Its Articles 13 and 14 carry the same bands and the same classification table. Still a draft, not law.
- EducationUSA Vietnam — Basic Information on Grading in Vietnam (US Embassy Hanoi, 2025 edition). Read in full. Source of the “completely inaccurate” statement, the top 10–15% class-rank point and the transcript certification process. Note the caution about its conversion table above.
- WES / WENR — Education in Vietnam country profile (November 2017). Read in full; the two grading tables are images, higher education and secondary. Its higher-education table is accurate and cites Decision 43/2007 as its source.
- WES — Vietnam country profile (PDF) (uploaded 2014). Read in full. Source of the higher-education table with no D band. Carries its own disclaimer: “Grading scales may vary. Please refer to grading scale on transcript.”
- WES / WENR — Secondary Education in Vietnam. Read in full. Source of the second secondary-school table, which disagrees with the one in the country profile.
Grade bands are set by regulation and by each university’s own quy chế. The figures on your official transcript are always the authoritative ones.
Key takeaways
- Circular 08/2021 contains two different tables: per-course grades (Article 9) and cumulative classification (Article 10 §5).
- The widely-circulated conversion table reproduces the second and labels it the first.
- Seven of eight sample marks convert differently between them.
- For course marks, A starts at 8.50 — not 9.0.
- WES publishes four Vietnamese tables across its own site and they disagree; the accurate one is an image in a 2017 article, and its country-profile PDF has no D band at all.