№ 01Why 2026 is the year to go to Pleiku

Pleiku has never been on the standard route. It is a red-earth highland town of coffee and pepper farms, 359 km inland from Hoi An, and for most foreign visitors it has been a name on a bus timetable rather than a destination.

That changes this year. Gia Lai province is hosting Vietnam’s National Tourism Year 2026, under the theme “Gia Lai — mountains embrace the sea”, with 244 events across the year — opening in March down on the coast at Quy Nhon and closing in late December in Pleiku itself. The sites being pushed are exactly the ones worth seeing: T’Nung lake, Chu Dang Ya volcano, the Bien Ho tea hills, and the Central Highlands gong culture that UNESCO recognised.

The practical effect is more signage, more organised events and more Vietnamese visitors, particularly at weekends — but nothing like the crowding of the coast. Go now and it is still a highland town where you will be the only foreigner in the coffee shop.

№ 02Every way from Hoi An to Pleiku, priced

The short version: this is a bus trip, and the only real decision is day or night. Everything else is a variation on the same road.

№ 03The bus in detail

Services run from Da Nang rather than Hoi An, so budget 30 km and 45 minutes to get to the departure point — most operators will arrange a pickup. There are two shapes of service. Day buses leave in a cluster around 06:30 to 07:30 and arrive in the late afternoon; sleepers leave between about 18:30 and 20:00 and get in the following morning. Both take ten to eleven hours, because the road, not the distance, sets the pace.

Fares start around 260.000₫ for a basic seat and climb toward 700.000₫ for the newer limousine vans with fewer passengers. On a ten-hour mountain run the extra is worth it more than it is on the coastal routes.

If you would rather break it up, get off at Kon Tum and take the local bus the last 50 km — an hour, and it costs almost nothing. Our Hoi An to Kon Tum guide covers that leg, the wooden cathedral and Mang Den.

№ 04Why you cannot fly, and there is no train

Pleiku does have an airport — PXU, six kilometres north of the city — which makes this more confusing than the Kon Tum case, where there is simply nothing. But it is served only from Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. There has never been a Da Nang route: the two cities are only about 300 km apart and no airline can fill an aircraft on it.

Flying from Hoi An would therefore mean Da Nang to Saigon and back north to Pleiku — most of a day, several times the price of the bus, and you still arrive at the same place. If you are coming from Hanoi or Saigon in the first place, flying into Pleiku is excellent. From here it is not.

And as everywhere in the Central Highlands, there is no railway. Vietnam’s line follows the coast; the nearest station to Pleiku is Dieu Tri, near Quy Nhon, about 160 km east over the An Khe pass.

№ 05Riding it: the Ho Chi Minh Road through Kon Tum

The route is the Kon Tum route plus fifty kilometres. West from Da Nang, south onto the Ho Chi Minh Road at Thanh My, then through Kham Duc and Dak Glei to Kon Tum, and finally the short straight run south to Pleiku. It is 359 km, and it is emphatically a two-day ride rather than a heroic one.

Break it at Kon Tum. That gives you a mountain day and a highland evening, and it means arriving in Pleiku fresh rather than at dusk with 350 km behind you. Fuel in Kham Duc and again in Kon Tum; the gaps between stations on the middle section are long.

№ 06Bien Ho, Chu Dang Ya and the tea hills

Bien Ho — T’Nung lake, called “the eyes of Pleiku” — is the one everybody comes for: a flooded volcanic crater a few kilometres north of town, ringed by pine, with a walkway out over the water. Go early, when the mist is still on it and before the tour groups.

Chu Dang Ya is the dormant volcano 30 km north-east, farmed in concentric rings up its slopes. It is worth the trip at any time and is extraordinary in November, when the da quy wild sunflowers turn the whole hillside yellow and the province runs a festival around it.

Between the two lie the Bien Ho tea hills and the row of hundred-year-old pines that every Vietnamese visitor photographs. Add Phu Cuong waterfall to the south, and the Jarai and Bahnar villages around the town where the gong music that UNESCO listed is still played — ask at your accommodation rather than turning up unannounced.

№ 07Pho kho, and the coffee

Pho kho Gia Lai is the dish, and it is the reason to eat breakfast here rather than on the bus. Locals call it pho hai to — “two-bowl pho” — because it arrives as exactly that: a bowl of dry noodles with pork and herbs, and a separate bowl of clear broth. You do not pour one into the other. Season the noodles, drink the broth alongside, and do not ask for it combined.

The other thing to do here is drink the coffee where it grows. Gia Lai is robusta country, the farms start at the edge of town, and a Vietnamese iced coffee in Pleiku costs a third of what it does in Hoi An and is better. Buy beans to take home from a roaster rather than a souvenir shop.

№ 08Pleiku is no longer a provincial capital

This is the change nobody outside Vietnam has registered. On 1 July 2025 the country cut its provinces from 63 to 34, and Binh Dinh province was merged into Gia Lai. The combined province kept the name Gia Lai — but its administrative centre moved to Quy Nhon, on the coast.

So Pleiku, which was the capital of Gia Lai for decades, is now a town in a province run from a beach city 160 km east. That is also the sense of the National Tourism Year theme, “mountains embrace the sea”: the province now runs from the Laos border to the South China Sea, and the year’s programme deliberately pairs the two halves. Our Hoi An to Quy Nhon guide covers the coastal end of the same province.

Practically, nothing has moved. Pleiku is where it was, the buses run as they did, and maps and signs still say what they always said. It matters only when an address or a booking says “Gia Lai” and you need to know whether that means the mountains or the sea.

Continuing south through the highlands? Buon Ma Thuot is about 190 km on — our Hoi An to Buon Ma Thuot guide covers the coffee country and the one highland flight that works.

№ 09When to go, and how long to stay

November to April is the dry season and the time to come — clear skies, cold mornings, and the coffee harvest running from November into December. November is the pick of it for the wild sunflowers on Chu Dang Ya. From May to October the afternoon rain is heavy and persistent and the red earth turns to mud.

Two nights is the sensible minimum given how long the road takes: one day for Bien Ho and the tea hills, one for Chu Dang Ya and a village. Three if you are coming in November and want the volcano at its best, or if you are pairing Pleiku with Kon Tum on the way in.

№ 10FAQ

The road distance was measured from Hoi An Old Town to central Pleiku; times assume normal traffic and no long stops. Bus fares and departure windows follow operator listings current at the time of writing and move with the season. National Tourism Year 2026 details follow Vietnamese state media reporting. The Binh Dinh–Gia Lai merger follows the 2025 provincial reorganisation effective 1 July 2025. Anh Khoa rents motorbikes, e-bikes and bicycles in Hoi An; we do not sell bus or air tickets, and we do not offer one-way drops to the highlands.