War Remnants Museum

The War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh City offers comprehensive exhibits on the Vietnam War, featuring photographs, artifacts, and military equipment. Established in 1975, it attracts approximately half a million visitors annually, providing insights into the war’s impact and the resilience of the Vietnamese people.

Planning your visit

The War Remnants Museum presents the Vietnam War from the Vietnamese perspective, and it makes no attempt at neutrality — it was originally called the Exhibition House for Crimes of War and Aggression. Established in 1975, months after the war ended, its galleries cover the French colonial period and the First Indochina War through the American war, built largely around photojournalism, including work by photographers killed covering the conflict. The courtyard holds captured American hardware: tanks, a Huey helicopter, artillery, a fighter-bomber. Inside are a reconstruction of the Côn Đảo prison tiger cages and an extensive, deliberately unflinching exhibition on Agent Orange and its intergenerational effects.

Around half a million people visit annually and most find it hard going. The Agent Orange room in particular is graphic, and worth knowing about in advance if you are travelling with children or are sensitive to medical imagery. Allow around two hours. The building is air-conditioned, which matters in Ho Chi Minh City's heat.

Most bookable options are walking tours pairing it with the Independence Palace a few streets away, where North Vietnamese tanks crashed the gates in April 1975 — the two sites together give both the conduct of the war and its ending, and the walk between them is short. Other formats extend further out: the Bến Dược section of the Củ Chi tunnels, noticeably less touristed than the main Bến Đình entrance, or routes taking in the Hanoi train street on longer itineraries. Some packages bundle practical extras like an e-SIM or hotel transfers. Current options are shown below.