World Bank reclassifies Vietnam as an upper-middle-income economy
The reclassification follows a jump in GNI per capita to US$4,970, powered by exports and sustained growth, but does not change current lending status.
- The World Bank has reclassified Vietnam as an upper-middle-income economy after its Gross National Income (GNI) per capita rose to US$4,970.
- This figure surpasses the World Bank's new threshold of US$4,636 required for an economy to be classified in the upper-middle-income category.
- Vietnam's economic growth was attributed to a successful "export-led" model, which resulted in strong GDP and export increases in recent years.
- The new classification supports Vietnam's national goal of becoming a high-income developed country by 2045.
Vietnam has been reclassified by the World Bank as an upper-middle-income economy in its latest country income classifications, released on July 1, after its gross national income (GNI) per capita rose to US$4,970 in 2025 from US$4,490 in 2024.
The latest figure put Vietnam above the World Bank’s upper-middle-income entry point of US$4,636 for the current 2027 fiscal-year classification.
The category now covers economies with GNI per capita of US$4,636 to US$14,375, compared with US$4,496 to US$13,935 in the previous classification.
The World Bank groups economies as low, lower-middle, upper-middle or high income using GNI per capita from the preceding calendar year.
The measure is expressed in US dollars under the Atlas method, which smooths short-term exchange-rate volatility, while thresholds are updated for inflation and may also be affected by economic and population growth, national-account changes and data revisions.
Vietnam’s rise was attributed to what the World Bank called an “export-led” model.
Exports increased by more than 15 per cent in both 2024 and 2025, while GDP expanded by 7 per cent and 8 per cent in those years, respectively. GNI grew by an average of 10 per cent annually between 2021 and 2025, “one of the strongest sustained runs in the region”, the bank said.
Vietnam was among six countries to climb to a higher income group among 218 economies assessed this year.
Jordan, Micronesia, the Philippines and Sri Lanka also moved from lower-middle to upper-middle-income status, with 2025 GNI per capita of US$5,260, US$4,760, US$4,850 and US$4,670, respectively.
Togo, a West African country, rose from low to lower-middle income after reaching US$1,350.
“The update matters because the classifications inform which countries can access concessional loans and development assistance, and help governments, researchers and a wide range of international organisations track economic progress worldwide,” the World Bank said.
The change does not alter current World Bank lending arrangements.
Vietnam and the Philippines remain borrowers from the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), while Sri Lanka remains in the International Development Association (IDA) group, the two main institutions under the World Bank Group.
Vietnam has set a target of becoming an industrialised upper-middle-income developing country by 2030 and a high-income developed country by 2045.
To support those ambitions, the country has set an economic growth target of at least 10 per cent for this year.
Source: Vietnam News
