The first Tết was not like this. There were no electric lights, no motorbike processions, no red envelopes printed with cartoon animals. The ancestors who first welcomed the new year would not recognize the holiday we celebrate today. And yet, they would recognize something—a feeling, a rhythm, a devotion that has survived all the changes of history. Tết has transformed across the centuries, but at its core, something remains unchanged.
To trace the evolution of Tết is to trace the evolution of Vietnam itself—through imperial courts and colonial occupation, through war and peace, through poverty and prosperity. Each era has left its mark on the holiday, adding layers of meaning, adapting ancient traditions to new circumstances. The Tết of 2026 is not the Tết of 1926, and that Tết was not the Tết of 1826. Yet the thread that connects them all is unbroken.
The earliest Tết celebrations emerged from the rice culture of the Red River Delta. For the ancient Việt, the new year was tied to the agricultural cycle—the end of the harvest, the beginning of spring, the moment when the land rested before the next planting. The festival was a time to thank the spirits for the harvest, to honor the ancestors who had cultivated the land before, and to pray for another year of abundance.
These early celebrations were simple, practical, deeply connected to the rhythms of nature. There were no elaborate rituals, no complex hierarchies of offerings. Families gathered, shared food, remembered their dead, and hoped for a good year ahead. The core of Tết—family, ancestors, hope—was already present in these ancient gatherings.
Under the dynasties—the Lý, the Trần, the Lê, and finally the Nguyễn—Tết became increasingly elaborate, especially at the imperial court. The emperor, as the intermediary between heaven and earth, had special responsibilities during the new year. He would perform rituals at the Temple of Heaven, offer prayers for the nation, and receive the homage of his mandarins.
Court Tết was a spectacle of hierarchy and power. Mandarins in their finest robes would process in order of rank. Elaborate banquets were prepared. Poetry was composed. The emperor would distribute gifts to his courtiers, reinforcing the bonds of loyalty and obligation that held the realm together.
In the villages, ordinary people had their own Tết, simpler but no less meaningful. The court’s elaborate rituals were distant echoes; what mattered was the family altar, the offerings to ancestors, the gathering of kin. Already, Tết had two faces—one public and hierarchical, one private and intimate.
Agricultural origins, ancestor veneration, simple village gatherings tied to the rice harvest and the cycles of nature.
Elaborate court rituals, mandarin processions, imperial offerings at the Temple of Heaven. Tết becomes a display of hierarchy and power.
French influence introduces new elements—Christmas decorations, Western foods, the Gregorian calendar. Tết becomes a symbol of national identity.
Urbanization, commercialization, digital greetings, electronic lucky money. Tết adapts to city life while preserving its core.
The French colonial period brought profound changes to Vietnamese society—and to Tết. The introduction of the Gregorian calendar created a parallel New Year celebration, though Tết remained the true holiday. Western goods appeared in markets, changing what families could offer and consume. French officials, observing Tết, were alternately fascinated and troubled by a celebration they could not fully understand.
For Vietnamese intellectuals, Tết became a site of resistance and identity. To celebrate Tết was to assert Vietnamese culture against colonial domination. The holiday took on political meaning, a way of saying: we are still here, we are still Vietnamese, our traditions survive.
Some French influences were absorbed. The Christmas tree, in some urban homes, appeared alongside the traditional decorations. Western foods—pâté, baguettes, wine—found their way onto Tết tables. But the core of the holiday remained intact, protected by its very intimacy, its location in the family home where colonial authorities could not reach.
The years after 1975, known as the subsidy period, were among the hardest for Vietnam—and for Tết. Food was scarce, goods were rationed, and the elaborate preparations that had once marked the holiday became nearly impossible. Families saved for months to afford a small chicken, a few sticks of incense, a handful of rice for bánh chưng.
Yet Tết endured. In fact, many who lived through this period remember it as a time when the true meaning of Tết was most clear. With no money for elaborate gifts or extravagant feasts, families focused on what mattered: gathering together, honoring ancestors, sharing whatever they had. The scarcity stripped away the commercial accretions and revealed the holiday’s essential core.
Children still received lucky money—sometimes just a few coins, wrapped in whatever red paper could be found. Families still made bánh chưng, even if the cakes were smaller, the ingredients humbler. The ancestors were still honored, the prayers still offered. Tết survived because it could not be destroyed by hardship; it was woven into the fabric of Vietnamese identity.
“In the hardest years, we learned what Tết really meant. It wasn’t the food or the gifts or the new clothes. It was the gathering—the knowledge that, no matter how hard the year had been, we would come together, we would remember those who had gone before, we would hope for something better. That couldn’t be rationed. That couldn’t be taken away.” — Memory of a grandmother from Hanoi
The economic reforms of the late 1980s and 1990s transformed Vietnam—and Tết—once again. As the country opened to the world, as incomes rose and goods became available, Tết became more elaborate, more commercial, more public. Shopping malls appeared, filled with Tết decorations. Advertisements urged people to buy, to consume, to celebrate with more.
The flower streets of Saigon and Hanoi grew more spectacular each year. Elaborate displays, sponsored by corporations, drew millions of visitors. Tết became a tourist attraction, a spectacle, a performance. For some, this commercialization threatened the holiday’s meaning. For others, it was simply a new expression of an old impulse—the desire to celebrate, to mark the new year with beauty and abundance.
In the 21st century, technology has transformed Tết yet again. Smartphones carry Tết greetings across the globe. Electronic lucky money—transfers made through banking apps—has become increasingly common. Social media fills with photographs of family gatherings, of flower displays, of the perfect bánh chưng. Vietnamese people who cannot return home can now participate virtually, their presence mediated by screens.
The digital Tết raises questions that previous generations never faced. Can a digital greeting carry the same weight as a spoken one? Does electronic lucky money have the same meaning as a red envelope passed from hand to hand? Historian Dương Trung Quốc reflects: “If it is just a dry money transfer transaction, then electronic lucky money is no different from other transactions in economic life. The important thing is to adapt tradition to the times while still preserving its core values.”
Through all these transformations, certain elements of Tết have remained constant. They are the threads that connect the ancient Việt to the modern Vietnamese, the villager to the city dweller, the grandmother to the grandchild.
The gathering of kin, the reunion of those separated by distance and time.
The altar, the incense, the offerings—the recognition that we are connected to those who came before.
The cleaning, the new clothes, the first bath—the hope that the new year can be different from the old.
The feast, the offerings, the meals shared across generations—the communion of eating together.
The prayers, the wishes, the red envelopes—the belief that the future can be better than the past.
The knowledge that this has all happened before, that it will all happen again—the comfort of tradition.
For the millions of Vietnamese living abroad, Tết has taken on new meanings. In the diaspora, the holiday becomes an act of memory, of resistance, of connection to a homeland that many have never seen. Families gather in ways they might not in Vietnam, self-consciously performing traditions that might otherwise be lost.
The Tết of the diaspora is often more traditional than the Tết of modern Vietnam—a frozen moment, preserving practices that have evolved or disappeared in the homeland. The bánh chưng made in California or Paris may be closer to the bánh chưng of fifty years ago than anything now made in Saigon. The diaspora holds onto Tết as a lifeline, a way of remaining Vietnamese across generations and oceans.
What will Tết look like in another fifty years? Will the rituals survive the continued march of modernization? Will young people, increasingly connected to global culture, still feel the pull of the ancestral altar?
The evidence suggests they will. Tết has survived everything history has thrown at it—war, poverty, colonization, economic transformation. It has adapted, changed, evolved, but it has never disappeared. Each generation has found its own way to celebrate, to honor ancestors, to gather family. The next generation will do the same.
The forms may continue to change. Perhaps one day, virtual reality will allow the diaspora to visit the family altar from across the world. Perhaps new dishes will join the traditional feast. Perhaps the red envelope will become entirely digital. But the core—family, ancestors, hope, renewal—will remain.
As you light the incense on your own family altar this Tết, consider the long chain of ancestors who have performed this same act. Consider the ancient Việt, in their stilt houses by the Red River, offering the first harvest to the spirits. Consider the mandarins of the imperial court, bowing before the emperor. Consider the families of the subsidy era, sharing their meager feast with grateful hearts. Consider the diaspora, thousands of miles away, lighting incense in homes that smell of Vietnam.
You are part of that chain. Your hands, holding the incense, are connected to all those hands that have held incense before. Your prayers echo all those prayers that have been offered across the centuries. Your love for your family is the same love that has bound Vietnamese families together since the beginning.
This is Tết through time. This is the holiday that has changed and not changed. This is the thread that binds all Vietnamese, past and present, to each other and to the hope of the new year.
