Thailand vs Vietnam - Which One is Better? Pros and Cons in 2023

often when we travel places after we've gone to say two different places we were really excited to go to we enjoyed doing a comparison for many reasons so we can share that with you if you're trying to decide maybe on one or the other but also it's kind of just a regroup for us like what did we like about this place what would dross maybe to come back again the next time so this is all about Thailand versus Vietnam what did we learn what didn't we know that we found out while we were there now we're going to start with a visa to get into these two countries in Thailand you don't need one if you have a U.S passport now that includes other countries as well check your own website and see what is required for you but in most cases you don't need a paper Visa you can just show up and stay for 30 days so that's a really easy look which made it the last time we were when we were just there they actually had an extended period so you could be there for 45 days so that was really a nice phone right and you can't extend the Visa too for longer than 30 days if you'd like there are consonants all over the place we noticed them in Chiang Mai Bangkok just going there's a fee you extend that visa and from all we understand it's pretty easy to do now for Vietnam it's not as easy you do need to apply for a Visa an e-visa online prior to arrival it's going to cost you twenty five dollars if you go through the government website right which is how we did it some of these other websites try and kind of give you a little scare tactic of if it doesn't work you don't get your money back and all that kind of stuff um and so they'll offer to do it for you for a fee we did it through the main website it was completely fine right on the website it tells you it's going to take three days for you to get to your approval and it was pretty much exactly three days and at this time you're getting 30 days for your visa and my understanding there isn't another Visa option at this point in Vietnam there is talk of that being changed and so you do have the option when you are leaving honestly both Thailand and Vietnam you can just leave on a Visa Run and then come back so you don't have to be out of the country for an extended period of time you just have to basically go across the border I think some require you fly out you can't just bus run it fly to another country take a weekend go somewhere and then you when you come back and you're then stamped again for that 30 days now in Vietnam it would be reapplying for the process and getting another 30 days where in Thailand you're just going to get stamped for another 30. now there are differences obviously in these two countries and we'll get to that but accommodations was not one of them we found some fantastic places in both countries in Thailand we had a rooftop pool we had a weight room we had everything we needed we had a washer we did not have house cleaning however no but everything else was right there it was yeah that was a great place um and then in Vietnam our place was fantastic we absolutely loved it and that was one thing we did have that we didn't get in Thailand was we had twice a week cleaning which was really nice so we haven't that's not common that's not something you see a lot but I did see it on a lot of listings in Vietnam so if that's something you're looking for then that might be the place for you but yeah the accommodations were fantastic and so I would say that both places it's kind of very similar the next big area is what was the food like drinking how accessible was that and the pricing on that and then also what about markets what about grocery stores convenience stores and also just kind of your nightmare you gotta eat we gotta eat and Thailand is one huge food court Thai food was amazing everywhere we went absolutely and it was accessible everywhere we went not only the street food but the convenience stores right there was a 7-Eleven weird places where it was like two in one block yeah so and these are small blocks so it's just funny the the accessibility to the convenience stores and then having food available to you in those convenience stores so there were plenty of times depending on the location we were staying at that point that we were actually getting our meals in 7-Eleven which can sound really crazy to say but they actually have really fantastic little frozen meals rice and curries and different kinds of stuff yeah they were great it was great and it yeah so that was really a fantastic thing about Thailand and the night markets in Thailand there are night markets were my favorite I just loved them they had such a variety of different kinds of foods now one of the differences between Thai food and Vietnamese food which we didn't know going in was Thai food seems to be a lot more spicy it's definitely a lot more flavor a lot more Punch Yeah and if you don't like spice you can always ask for no spice but uh half the time we would get the spice and we we grew accustomed to it we did we actually yeah we liked it and we found that as we we were away from it we would miss that so we yeah it might be hard going forward because some of the areas you go to spice not a thing so might have to travel with some spices in our bag it's a good idea okay now if you've been following this Channel at all you know that we like to partake in a beer every once in a while in Thailand the beer was a little more often delivered yeah it's too thirsty at some point every day beer in Thailand costs a little bit more than we had expected going in now it wasn't crazy expensive but it was more than we thought it was going to be now in Thailand we found there was there was a craft beer scene but the craft beers were so expensive that we never had one and and when I say expensive now I'm sure like if we go home back into the states it's a similar to what we were being paying there but honestly it was more expensive so when I was looking at one menu at a place they were at that had a lot of different craft beers to choose from the average price of those craft beers started at eight to nine dollars and went up from there and we were talking just for a regular size glass I drink a lot of Chang yeah so we we drink the local beers which were great especially because it's so hot and and they really they were still in the scheme of things affordable but still more than what we anticipated right no yeah exactly we we thought it was just going to be Dirt Cheap it was wasn't it was a little bit more like I said I drink a lot of Chang now others drink Leo there's a there's a debate which is better I prefer Chang if you've had each let us know convince me Leo's better you won't be able to do it but you can try now in Vietnam we were really excited right on arrival when we saw that the beer prices were about half the price if not weigh less if you got their local on the street little glass of beer you pay just I'm really not much money at all for him but if you are stopping grabbing one of their local beers it was maybe half the price that we were paying in Thailand and then their craft beer scene was really great and it was maybe a third of the price of what you were paying in Thailand yeah that was nice we had a great we had a great time you always have a better time when you have a beer in your hand so it just made Vietnam that much better much better now the food in Vietnam is also very good is it as good as the food in Thailand it's Up For Debate the big food of choice in Vietnam is the ban me balmy and and right yeah now fuzz soup if you love soup you're in a good spot the Bun Me is a sandwich a tasty sandwich a good sandwich but a sandwich all the same to me I prefer the Thai food yeah I I found that I was missing the vegetables I was missing the variety yeah I was missing the vegetables myself he wasn't missing he didn't even notice they were missing the the soup wasn't just the pho it's it's a lot of different kinds of soup that they have to offer so that is just one of the main dishes there in Vietnam now it's not saying that the food is not great it's just we found that it was less flavorful and that it had no Spice in it sometimes a little bit of spice but very very little spice we just if we're being honest got kind of bored of the food yeah so we found ourselves looking for different options now there's two things on that we just came from Thailand and you can't really beat that and we were leaving Vietnam to go back to Thailand yeah so so we're kind of looking forward we had something else to look forward to so nothing against the food at all we're just we just love the food in Thailand right now as far as like street food which is something that we absolutely love when we're traveling because it's convenient it's easy it's also less expensive so coming into Vietnam I think we kind of anticipated we were going to have a similar street food scene that we had in Thailand and you didn't have that it's not as common in Vietnam it you definitely still have some street food going on but the variety once again there's not a lot of variety and it's just not something that's all over the place right and one point I would like to make we've been asked this question many times since we've been in Southeast Asia have we gotten sick after eating any of this food and the answer is no we have not had any problems with any of the street food in either country right now we have two weeks left have not gotten for me eating the food here we are I would say careful in the way that we make sure that we're eating it at a food stand that is clean and the food is being processed through pretty quickly they're cooking it in front of you things like that we do not drink the water in the in our home we either boil it or we're buying a bottled water stuff like that but we're not Ultra cautious and we haven't had an issue so if that is a concerned area for you I think you can breathe a little easy and just be really selective of where you're eating right just calm down that never works can I have a big difference between Vietnam and Thailand is the convenience stores I would say in Vietnam they're just stores they're they're really not very convenient because there's not very many of them now we did find a spot close to our Airbnb that we would frequent that serviced us well but if we're out and about we just did not find an easy pop in 7-Eleven because they don't have any yeah there actually are no 7 but the Carter for the convenience convenience stores and they didn't have the same selection of maybe those kind of easy meals to make at home and stuff like that so um so that was kind of a downside for that now also the other thing is a Night Market me being excited for the nightmare because I love those uh they did not have the same night market scene they lean more towards the fish in Vietnam so you saw a lot of fish options which is great but the one thing we found in Vietnam in comparison to Thailand and we only found this at the markets they were incredibly pushy they're very pushy and when we say pushy not just do you want to eat here they are in your face with a menu and they don't stop they don't stop yeah they don't stop so that might be a reason you want to avoid some of those night markets you also might want to avoid them I carry it was saying a lot of it's fish based so if you've got fish allergies or any Seafood allergies you might want to just stir yeah it would be a tough place to go yeah and and we do want to be clear that we personally experience that level of kind of aggressiveness and pushiness uh the rest of Vietnam wasn't like that so we don't want to all say that that was you know a bad part of it we just experienced that at the market in dunang coming into southeast Asia we decided to start in Bangkok right into the frying pan we're going to get after it we expect it to be crazy chaotic loud it was all of those things but very manageable and I think one of the reasons why is because of the transportation system right we did expect to be overwhelmed and we now in Bangkok they have so many great options for transportation and we utilized a lot of those during the week that we were there but our favorite out of all of them was their SkyTrain system and their subway system it was so easy to navigate it got you all over the city to all the locations within walking distance very easy walking distance to all the things that you'd want to see and Incredibly affordable yeah we had a great time and day one we got on that subway system and figured it out which made the rest of the week that much easier so if you are going to Bangkok just go in and figure it out get it done yeah now Bangkok and the rest of Thailand also has other forms of transportation which are easy to use of course they have taxis but they also have the apps you can use you can use grab you can use bolt which is supposedly cheaper you can use in Drive they have tuk-tuks they have the red trucks they have a metro system and that's going to vary just a little bit by the location you're in what's available right up in Chiang Mai we're paying what 30 Baht no matter where we wanted to go for the little red truck we know it's not called little red truck that's what we like that's what we like to call it's we're sticking to it you'll see them when you're there but they're very practical very easy to jump on and off next we hop over to Hanoi Vietnam and let me tell you it's probably good that wasn't our starting point because it might have been what scared us about coming to Southeast Asia in the start that overwhelmed feeling was very much there it was chaotic but it wasn't the chaos that got you so much honestly it was the noise they honk for everything in Vietnam they honk if they're gonna go to the right of you they honk if they're gonna go to the left of you they weren't working they were harming for no reason at all they're going down the road honestly just talking but they have it's kind of their mode of trans or mode of communication on the road you're not seeing blinkers and stuff like that it they use their horn to kind of just let people know they're passing them the noise became a bit much so had we originally started our time in Hanoi it was a little chaotic okay one of the things we use the most if not every time in Vietnam was grab we would literally order up a grab on our app go downstairs and within a minute he'd be waiting for it yeah is that convenient yeah um it was inexpensive so we went with that now they do have a lot of taxi cabs too and when you walk out of any establishment a grocery store or whatever you're gonna have taxi cab drivers waiting to take you where you need to go all you need to do is show them what the price grab is going to pay we would charge you and they'll match that price so you don't even need to use grab we found it awfully convenient the other thing we didn't notice at all when we were traveling around Vietnam like a really good Metro system or in Hanoi we didn't see the sky Train and stuff like that so um I can't really speak on you know we just didn't see it anymore there are so many motorcycles and mopeds and scooters that maybe buses can't get around we don't know yeah but we just didn't see the ease of jumping on a bus yeah or yeah there just wasn't that that simple ease of Transportation there but with that it wasn't a big deal for us because grabs were so affordable to use and so accessible so it really wasn't a big deal now the next thing that both of these countries have and have a lot of are the beaches and we stayed on beaches in both locations but now in Thailand we stayed in Koh Samui and we stayed in Phuket and the beaches in those areas were kind of what we envisioned as I don't know southeast Asia vacation Thailand what we were going to see we had the white the white sand we had the Blue Water we had the the little uh beach bars right there where your feet are in the sand and you're having a beer on the beach and stuff so they definitely checked a lot of those boxes for us beautiful beaches every box I think now in Vietnam we stayed in Da Nang for the whole month we were there we only had 30 days that beach is also equally is fantastic now it's a city beach so you've got a busy road right behind you but you do have bars and restaurants right on the beach so you can get that beer with your feet in the sand which we love to do yeah it's a great there's surfing there's everything you might need now we loved it so much and next year we're planning going back to Vietnam and exploring a little more of that country because it's a beautiful country we're going to Ho Chi Minh City and we're going to head up the coast from there so we'll experience more of the Vietnam beaches in the next year yeah I I think that in if we're comparing the two of them I would say the beach in Danang Brian was saying was absolutely gorgeous it was a super Long Beach I feel like a nice Beach to walk on it was great for that it had the waves and everything like that but it was maybe missing that element of that feeling of kind of that beachy vacation feel yeah the tropical yeah that tropical theme that would be the main difference but not at all dismissing how gorgeous the beach was we loved it right now the activities in both of these countries besides the beaches and the beer drinking with your feet in the sand there are other options as well in Vietnam we did a hulong bay Cruise three days two nights and it was fantastic that was fantastic and then out of Danang you can go to Hoi An which is amazing and should definitely be on everybody's list if you're in that area to go there absolutely and and then in Thailand we went to Maya Bay and did a day trip out of uh Phuket and once again a must-see did my snorkeling for the first time some of you may know dangerous circumstances some sharks baby sharks yeah so there's plenty there's no lack of activities or day trips or whatever you are looking to do as adventurous or not as adventurous in any of those areas there's plenty to do the people and the language now the people in both countries are fantastic they're just amazing kind people that smile they want you to be there now we have had some comments on our Channel about the Vietnam War Vietnamese called the American War we have not gotten any pushback from any local at any point on any of that very sweet kind people very welcoming very welcoming yeah we felt we felt comfortable yes now Taurus language barrier it goes in either of those areas now in Thailand we found really no language where of course there are certain circumstances where there was a little bit but never to where it was a point to a point that you felt you weren't able to order food or you couldn't get something so it all worked out fine Vietnam was we did find that there was maybe a little bit of language barrier not in your main tourist areas but if you kind of got out of those touristy areas then there was a little bit but once again it's not really that challenging because they're so kind they want to try and understand you and they're very kind in trying to have you understand them so so that makes all the difference honestly and it never hurts to learn a few terms please and thank you they go a long ways and honestly out of all the places we've been in the last year and a half is really only the older generation that may not speak English everybody else we haven't had to use Google Translate I don't think one time no and and if you and if you play We Do for other things so we're in the grocery store if you need menu or something like that you can take a picture or hold it up to a menu or sign and it will actually translate that page to the language that you are wanting it to translate to so that is a fantastic thing to have yeah it sounds sounds expensive you it's free you can talk into it and it will then put in that language what it is that you're trying to say so that's a fantastic thing to have you can download the language that you're going to be needing ahead of time so if you don't have Wi-Fi service it's okay you will be able to still use it the other thing that is really great and was so fantastic coming here because we even if it says what something is I like seeing a picture of the food I'm going to be eating and their menus pretty much across the board pretty much everywhere you go there's a picture of the drinks and of what you're going to be eating yeah I like pictures yeah it just I don't know let's make sure it's more excited for what's to come a picture book now is safety an issue in Thailand you probably assume not because it's a hot tourist destination everybody goes there but what about Vietnam well we felt very safe in Vietnam and in Thailand equally we go out at night we walk around we never at any point have felt unsafe or insecure that we do take precautions we are very aware we know our surroundings we decide not to go to those places where you know maybe you shouldn't be going but you can do that any City anywhere in the world so we have felt very safe the entire time we've been here so now when I was looking up out of curiosity where they rank on on the concerning place anyways Bangkok ranked it 59 for safety which is is kind of in that low level and then we'll go with Hanoi in Vietnam and that ranked at 62 which equally is just really close so they're both they're both seen as very safe places to be they are both ranked as very safe to be walking during the daytime alone and they are ranked as middle range to be walking at night alone that like Brian was saying would go for anywhere that you were going to be and just kind of fun fact when I cross checked and compared to a couple places in the states both of these locations rank as being quite a bit safer on most of the levels than Seattle or New York so you know I think sometimes you see these other countries and you just right away jump to a conclusion that you're going to be going oh are you going to be safe look at where you're from right and kind of look at that as a comparison well you know so yeah there's your answer yeah we felt completely safe the entire time what about weather now obviously these countries are both in the same region of the world so you're going to get very typical weather for that region of the world there's a monsoon season and there's a dry season it's very important you check which is which before you travel right so you want to make sure that you are checking for each location you're going to be going to because there is quite a variation in those locations so even though it's a dry season and you're maybe in that Northern Territory that doesn't necessarily mean that it's going to be dry in all those areas now when we were in Da Nang we made sure and checked what the temperature was going to be because we were really excited moonshine and heat it was warm enough well for the most part it was warm enough for us but it was raining and we didn't expect that because we didn't look at that so make sure when you're looking that you're actually checking the temperature as La as well as what's the average rainfall for that month that you're going to be going because that's important as well one thing that I would add to that though for any of these areas that you're looking at when we talk about rainy season in a lot of areas not all of them because some when it's Monsoon it just rains for days on end but a lot of them you have this quick downpour that comes through within you know 20 minutes a half an hour you get pretty amazing storm that comes with it thunder and lightning and then it's gone so it's really it's still it's still you can still enjoy your time there you're not hunkered down all the time but it is whether it's something to take into consideration okay this category is probably the most interesting to a lot of you and that's how much these countries cost cost of living both these countries are affordable we have done a video on each of these countries on what we spent the entire time we spent in each of these countries so check those videos out but we have found that we could actually live life a little bit beyond what we already do we were able to eat out we were able to drink the beers when we wanted to we were able to do any type of excursions that we wanted to because these two countries were relatively affordable yeah now in Thailand [Music] participated it to be we could have absolutely cut costs in certain areas if we were traveling back say to some of the areas that we were going to it would cost us quite a bit less because we wouldn't need to go and see all the things that we went and saw we would still be enjoying all the food and everything like that but there would be areas where you could cut the cost we also choose to stay in comfortable airbnbs we don't go Way Beyond on budget but we we have amenities like we mentioned that we want we're not staying hostels no we're not doing that but we did find that the cost um of your housing and just the beer pricing and all of that kind of stuff to be a little bit more than we anticipated so we did find Vietnam to be a lot less expensive than Thailand you got a lot more for your money in your Airbnb you got a lot more of bang for your buck basically beer in your mind beer in your mug your accommodations were a lot less expensive for really the same thing so that was something that really appealed to us yeah it definitely did there was we got to enjoy we got to enjoy life a lot more in both places but we felt like you've got a little bit more for your money in Vietnam even our accommodation honestly our accommodation in Vietnam was a nicer place it was a night it was a bigger place and stuff so I do think that your dollar stretches a little bit further in Vietnam and uh it's a place that if you're looking to have a month to maybe save a little bit and live in a great place then that might be a good one for you so we absolutely loved both these countries we have plans like we mentioned to return to both places and see more of the country as well next year actually so if you have any areas that you have traveled in these countries or you have any things that you've seen that you've liked about one or disliked you know let us know in the comments no you know I don't feel like we got enough time in Vietnam you know so we're definitely gonna spend time in Vietnam next year yeah let us know what we need to see because uh we didn't get enough Vietnam we didn't get enough Vietnam we'll for sure be going back to Thailand if it isn't just for the food I will be missing the Thai food when we leave here so thanks for watching we really hope that this video kind of provided you a little bit of insight to the two locations and what what the pros cons or whatever about them so thank you we wouldn't be here if it wasn't for you thanks so much subscribe thumbs up all right cheers we would literally get on our app order an AB let me start up [Music]

Channel: Brian and Carrie

Views: 82,836

Keywords: thailand vs vietnam, Brian and Carrie, thailand 2023, vietnam 2023, vietnam travel, thailand 2023 travel, thailand 2023 travel guide, vietnam travel 2023, vietnam vs thailand, vietnam travel guide, vietnam tourism, thailand travel, vietnam travel video, vietnam travel vlog, vietnam travel tips, vietnam places, thai food, koh samui, phuket, chiang mai thailand, bangkok, da nang vietnam, hanoi vietnam

Id: WMMm2WpJYsI

Length: 28min 15sec (1695 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 01 2023