Every year one date bends the entire Vietnamese production calendar, and every year a few foreign buyers are caught by it. Tet — the Lunar New Year — is when Vietnam's factories effectively stop. In 2026 it falls on 17–18 February (the Year of the Horse), and if your materials have to be on a February vessel, the planning starts now, not in January.

The real shutdown window

The official public holiday is a handful of days, but the effective shutdown is longer. Most factories close for about 10 to 14 days, with the practical window running roughly 12–25 February 2026. That is the number to plan against — not the two or three official days.

And the reopening is softer than the calendar implies. Many workers travel long distances home and return late, so the first two weeks after Tet run below full capacity: lines are under-staffed, throughput lags, and quality control needs closer attention precisely when everyone is rushing to catch up. Treat late February and early March as a ramp, not a resumption.

The order-timing rule

Here is the part that catches people. Factories don't keep taking work up to the holiday — they typically stop accepting new orders in early February, running only urgent or already-confirmed production through the final stretch. A purchase order that lands on 5 February hoping to produce before Tet has almost certainly missed.

Two more timing facts compound it:

  • China's Lunar New Year is the same festival, the same week. If any of your inputs, components or logistics touch China, they slow at exactly the same time — so the disruption stacks at both ends of the supply chain.
  • Ports and freight thin out too. Bookings tighten and schedules get ragged around the holiday, which can add time even to goods already produced.

The practical rule: work backward from your site date. If materials must be produced in February, the order should generally be confirmed and deposited before mid-January to hold a slot ahead of the shutdown. If it can wait, plan for a realistic restart from the first week of March. Our landing planner does this arithmetic for you — enter your foundation date and it walks back through production, ex-factory and vessel loading, and Tet is exactly the kind of fixed obstacle it's built to route around.

Why we flag it early

A sourcing desk that ignores Tet quietly costs a buyer a month. We'd rather say it in July: if your program has February or March materials on it, let's place the order with the shutdown already in the plan, and use the vetted backup factories to hold the schedule if a primary line comes back slow. A holiday you planned for is a non-event. A holiday you discover in February is a delay.

Sources & data notes

Tet 2026 dates (17–18 February), the ~10–14 day effective factory shutdown (roughly 12–25 February), the slower post-holiday restart, the early-February cut-off for new orders, and the overlap with China's Lunar New Year are drawn from 2025–2026 Vietnam manufacturing and holiday-schedule reporting. Exact closure dates vary by factory and are often longer than the official holiday; confirm each supplier's specific Tet schedule when you place the order. For planning only.

Have February or March materials on your program? Send us one BOM and we'll plan the order around the Tet shutdown, with backup factories held in reserve — proposal within 48 hours. Our own fiber-cement line, DURAGREEN®, runs on the same planned calendar.