The Hoi An Lantern Festival happens on the 14th night of every lunar month — the evening before each full moon — which means twelve specific dates fall inside the 2027 calendar year. On each one, the Old Town switches off its electric lights from roughly 6 to 10 pm, hangs silk lanterns as the only illumination, and fills the Thu Bồn with floating candle-floats. This is the verified 2027 calendar — exact Gregorian dates with the lunar conversions done for you, cross-checked against Tết (6 Feb) and Mid-Autumn (15 Sep) — plus what actually happens, the lights-off window, and how to see it from the quiet side of the river.
On twelve evenings in 2027, the electric lights along Hội An's Old Town go dark on purpose and the streets revert to candle and moonlight. Silk lanterns become the only real light source, the Sông Hoài (the Hội An arm of the Thu Bồn) fills with thousands of floating candle-floats drifting downstream, and for about twenty minutes around dusk the town looks almost exactly as it did three centuries ago. Arrive on the wrong night and you get none of it — just a normal evening in a busy town. So the single most useful thing this guide gives you is the right dates.
The Hoi An Lantern Festival — Lễ hội đèn lồng, known locally as Đêm Rằm Phố Cổ ("Old Quarter Full-Moon Night") — falls on the 14th day of every lunar month, the evening before each full moon. This is the detail almost every English-language listing gets wrong: it is the 14th night, not the 15th, and not "sometime this month." Get the date right and everything else follows.
A note on accuracy: the dates below are computed from the lunar calendar and cross-checked against two fixed anchors for 2027. Tết 2027 — the first day of the lunar new year (Mùng 1 Tết) — falls on Saturday 6 February 2027, opening the Year of the Goat (Đinh Mùi). 2027 has no leap month, so the twelve lunar months run straight through the Gregorian year. And *Mid-Autumn (Tết Trung Thu), the full moon of lunar month 8, falls on Wednesday 15 September 2027* — which fixes the festival eve to Tuesday 14 September. Every date in this guide is verified against those anchors.
If you only get one night, make it Friday 19 February 2027 (Nguyên Tiêu, the first full moon of the lunar year) or Tuesday 14 September 2027 (the eve of Mid-Autumn). Those two carry the most ceremony — and in 2027 both fall on convenient evenings, with the Mid-Autumn eve landing on a Tuesday before the Wednesday full moon. If you want the festival without the heaviest crowds, the lower-season nights — 21 January, 11 November, 11 December — give you the same lights-off Old Town with room to breathe.
The river becomes a second source of light. Locals and visitors light small candle-floats — hoa đăng, paper lanterns with a candle inside — and release them onto the Sông Hoài from the An Hội footbridge and from small wooden boats launching off the Bạch Đằng quay. Each float carries a wish. Between roughly 7:00 and 9:00 pm the water fills with them, drifting downstream toward the Thu Bồn's main channel. Cultural performances run alongside: bài chòi folk singing at the An Hội square, traditional music on the Bạch Đằng stage, calligraphy at the assembly halls. By 10:00 pm normal lighting and traffic resume.
The lights-off idea has a documented origin. The Trung tâm Quản lý Bảo tồn Di sản Văn hóa Hội An (Hội An's heritage conservation centre) traces the monthly tắt đèn điện — "turn off the electric lights" — to a 1998 municipal decision, an idea associated with the Polish architect Kazimierz Kwiatkowski, who began documenting Hội An's vernacular architecture in 1982. Since mid-2025, following the administrative reorganisation that placed Hội An and Mỹ Sơn under Đà Nẵng, that same centre operates under Đà Nẵng's culture authority — so the 2027 festival calendar, like 2026's, is governed at the Đà Nẵng level.
The action concentrates on the Sông Hoài between the An Hội footbridge and the Cẩm Nam bridge, with the Bạch Đằng riverfront on the north (Old Town) bank as the densest spot. By about 7:15 pm on a peak night, the An Hội bridge and Bạch Đằng quay are shoulder to shoulder. You do not have to stand in that.
The water itself is the festival, which means the calmest seat is on it or across it. From our own riverside vantage on the Thu Bồn, the pattern that works is simple: come early for the blue-hour window, or watch from the far bank. Five approaches:
One — the blue-hour window. Reach the Bạch Đằng riverfront by 5:00 pm and take a spot on the steps facing the water. Lanterns come on against a cobalt twilight sky before the crowd builds. The best light is roughly 5:45 to 6:20 pm. Two — from a boat. A small rowing boat (about 120,000–200,000 VND for 45 minutes) puts you mid-river among the floats. Book by 5 pm; availability is tight on festival nights. Three — the south bank at Cẩm Nam. Walk five minutes past the An Hội night market to any riverside deck on Cẩm Nam and watch across toward the Old Town. The lantern reflections from this angle are often better than from the crowded north bank, and you will have a table. Four — inside, not on the river. The Quan Công Temple courtyard and the Tấn Ký old-house interior fill with candlelight on festival nights and see a fraction of the crowd. Quiet, atmospheric, and a different kind of photograph. Five — Cẩm Kim island. A short ferry across the Thu Bồn reaches Cẩm Kim, where local families do their own smaller release with a fraction of the tourist density. Fewer lanterns on the water, more of the actual community.
A practical thread that ties it together: where you sleep decides how much of the evening you actually enjoy. Staying on the Thu Bồn rather than inside the pedestrian core means you can walk or take a short boat to the release, then retreat to quiet water when the crowd peaks — instead of fighting back through the night market to a hotel deep in the Old Town. (We are a riverside hotel on the Thu Bồn ourselves, which is exactly why we lay the evening out this way: the festival is a thing you visit, then come home from.)
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When is the Hoi An Lantern Festival in 2027? It is held on the 14th night of every lunar month. In 2027 that falls on: 21 Jan, 19 Feb, 21 Mar, 19 Apr, 19 May, 17 Jun, 17 Jul, 15 Aug, 14 Sep, 13 Oct, 11 Nov, and 11 Dec. The most atmospheric are 19 February (first full moon of the lunar year, Nguyên Tiêu) and 14 September (eve of Mid-Autumn).
What time does the Hoi An Lantern Festival start and end? Motorbikes are cleared from the core around 5:30 pm, electric lights go off from roughly 6:00 to 10:00 pm, and the candle-float release on the river peaks between about 7:00 and 9:00 pm.
When is the biggest lantern night in Hoi An in 2027? The two largest are Friday 19 February 2027 (Nguyên Tiêu, the first full moon of the lunar year, the eve of Rằm tháng Giêng) and Tuesday 14 September 2027 (the night before Mid-Autumn / Tết Trung Thu).
When is Mid-Autumn (Tết Trung Thu) in Hoi An in 2027? The Mid-Autumn full moon falls on Wednesday 15 September 2027. Because the Hội An festival is held on the 14th of the lunar month — the eve of the full moon — the big Mid-Autumn lantern night in the Old Town is Tuesday 14 September 2027. Children's lantern processions and múa lân (lion dance) often spill into the following evening as well.
Is the lantern festival on every night in Hoi An? No. Silk lanterns are lit in the Old Town most evenings year-round, but the full Đêm Rằm Phố Cổ — lights off, traffic closed, river-float release — happens only on the 14th night of each lunar month.
Do you have to pay to see the Hoi An Lantern Festival? The festival itself is free to walk through. You will need an Ancient Town entry ticket to enter heritage houses and assembly halls, and a candle-float (hoa đăng) costs about 20,000–40,000 VND if you want to release one. A short boat ride is roughly 120,000–200,000 VND.
Can you release a lantern on the river yourself? Yes. Buy a hoa đăng from a riverside vendor and release it from the An Hội bridge, the Bạch Đằng quay, or a small boat. Local custom is to make a wish as you set it on the water.
Is the lantern festival worth seeing during the rainy season (Oct–Nov)? It can be, but watch the forecast. October and November are Hội An's wettest months and the Old Town can flood in bad years; the 13 October and 11 November nights are lovely in dry spells but may be cancelled or curtailed during high water. If your trip lands in this window, keep a backup night and watch the Thu Bồn level.
This calendar synthesises the official record of the Trung tâm Quản lý Bảo tồn Di sản Văn hóa Hội An on the 14th-night Đêm Rằm Phố Cổ lights-off protocol, coverage of the 2025 move placing Hội An's heritage management under Đà Nẵng, and the fixed 2027 lunar anchors — Tết on 6 February, no leap month, and the Mid-Autumn full moon on 15 September. The hotel-side contribution is the verified 2027 lunar-to-Gregorian date table and the viewing plan tuned to the Sông Hoài release window between the An Hội and Cẩm Nam bridges, observed first-hand from the Thu Bồn riverside.
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