Vietjet Delhi-Saigon direct flights from July

I had written earlier about how Vietnam makes an ideal direct flight destination from India. Now that seems to be materializing.

The news is that Vietjet, Vietnam's popular private airline, nicknamed Bikini airline is all set to fly between New Delhi and Ho Chi Minh city (formerly known as Saigon) from July 2018. Vietjet will operate 4 flights per week. [News source: Financial Times]

This is good news. Vietnam has a relatively easy eVisa policy, is an extremely affordable destination to visit and has lots of natural beauty visitors can explore. At present visiting Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh would need one stop flight via Kuala Lumpur or Singapore or Bangkok. With the new direct flight, Delhi people can travel non stop (about 3-4 hours) while rest of India can fly one stop via Delhi. Check this post for exploring Vietnam on Budget. Click here for my other Vietnam posts.

Vietjet website is yet to be updated with New Delhi as a destination. Airline largely operates A320 and A321 fleet. At present cheapest return ticket to Ho Chi Minh city costs at about 10-12k during Air Asia Sale and about 15-20k under normal conditions. Let us see how VietJet prices its tickets.

VietJet rose to popularity after a photoshoot involving its cabin crew posing in Bikini. But to set expectations right- don't expect cabin crew to work in two pieces on every flight- they do it only on some select occasions. Airline also got penalized multiple times by the authorities for violating various code of conducts, but I guess fine amount is nothing compared to publicity airline got with bikini crew.
VietJet landing in Macau, clicked by me in 2016
VietJet is not part of star alliance. Let us see which airline they will partner in India for extended connectivity. Hopefully they will add few more Indian cities to their network once Delhi-SGN route becomes a success. This should also encourage from Indian airlines to fly direct to Hanoi or SGN.

If you're visiting Vietnam you may wish to visit Hanoi as well. So it might be a good idea to book one way to Saigon (Ho Chi Minh city) and return separately via Hanoi or vice versa. 

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