Licences & Legal Eligibility
Pedestrians on a Crossing in Vietnam: Must a Motorbike Stop or Just Slow Down?
About 3 minutes to read
You are riding a rental bike through Hanoi and someone steps onto a marked crossing right in front of you. Is slowing down enough, or must you stop? The answer sits in Vietnam’s Law on Road Traffic Order and Safety (Law 36/2024/QH15, in force since 1 January 2025), read here next to three pages on the Traffic Police Department’s portal.
The law says ‘slow down or stop’
Article 12(3)(a) requires drivers to observe, and to slow down or stop to keep things safe, where there are road markings or other signals for pedestrians, or where pedestrians or wheelchair users are crossing. That point sets no condition about traffic lights.
By signal: with lights and without
| Situation | What the text says | Where it says so |
|---|---|---|
| Green light, pedestrians or a wheelchair user on the carriageway | You may go, but must slow down or stop to give way | Article 11(4)(a) |
| Flashing yellow light | You may go, but must observe, and slow down or stop to give way to pedestrians or other vehicles | Article 11(4)(b) |
| Red light | No entry. A Dak Lak Traffic Police page (17 April 2026) adds: stop before the stop line, or before the light pole where there is no line | Article 11(4)(c); stopping position: the Dak Lak page |
| No light; crossing markings or signals, or someone crossing | Observe, and slow down or stop to keep things safe | Article 12(3)(a) |
The table has no row for a steady yellow light. Article 11(4)(b) says to stop before the stop line and adds a case in which you may continue; the pages word that case differently, so this guide does not summarise it.
Other rules at a crossing
- No overtaking on a pedestrian crossing, or when pedestrians are crossing: Article 14(6)(h) and (i).
- No stopping, parking or reversing on a pedestrian crossing: Article 18(4)(g) and Article 16(2). Article 18(7) has its own rule for breakdowns and force majeure.
- Turning across a crossing: signal the turn (Article 15(2)) and give way to pedestrians (Article 15(3)).
On 29 July 2026 the Traffic Police portal reported that a Hanoi traffic police team booked a car driver for parking on a pedestrian crossing, with the advice never to stop or park there.
‘Or stop’: which one applies?
The law names both options and sets no threshold between them, and none of the pages gives a distance or a speed. When you are not sure that slowing down is enough to give way, stopping is still one of the two options the law names. Be careful with older pages: a 2022 question-and-answer page on the portal follows the previous Road Traffic Law, and its sentence about a flashing yellow light has no ‘stop’ in it.
Where to check the text
Open Law 36/2024/QH15 on vbpl.vn, look for the ‘in force’ label and the update date, then find Articles 11, 12, 14, 15, 16 and 18. Hanoi closes some central streets to vehicles at weekends; for parking around them see Hanoi weekend walking streets: plan your motorbike parking.
What the pages leave out
No page says when ‘crossing’ begins, or whether a person waiting at the kerb counts. None says exactly where to stop when you give way, apart from the ban on stopping on the crossing itself.
Sources checked
- Law 36/2024/QH15 on vbpl.vn (marked in force, updated 29 March 2026)
- Traffic Police Department portal, 17 April 2026: traffic lights and road markings
- Traffic Police Department portal, 29 July 2026: parking on a pedestrian crossing in Hanoi
The Vietnamese version of this guide lists every page with its date.
Questions to ask the shop before your first crossings
Ask how to test the front and rear brakes on the bike you will collect, and where there is a quiet place to try a slow stop. Ask how the indicators work on that bike, because Article 15(2) requires a turn signal. Nguyen Ha’s phone number is 0334 699 969; riders who are new to gears can compare bikes on semi-automatic motorbike rental in Hanoi.
