Duolingo English Test Course for Students in Vietnam — Online with Certified Instructors

Where Vietnamese students apply — and the DET score each asks for

The main destinations for Vietnamese applicants — the United States, Australia, Canada and the UK — are where DET acceptance is deepest, and over 6,000 institutions accept it. US requirements cluster like this:

Australia, the other great Vietnamese destination, publishes a wider spread:

Canadian minimums are consistent: 120 at Toronto, Waterloo, Queen’s and Ottawa, 125 at UBC, 115–125 at McGill.

In the UK, DET is mainstream at universities including York, Sussex, Southampton, Hertfordshire, Sheffield Hallam, Portsmouth and UCLan, typically at 105–125 with subscore rules that often read “overall 120, no subscore below 110” — see our UK score requirements guide.

The pattern: bachelor’s admission usually sits at 95–120 and postgraduate programmes at 115–135. Find your programme in Duolingo’s accepting-institutions directory, then confirm with admissions.

Do universities inside Vietnam accept DET?

Be careful here, because the most-cited Vietnamese example is a refusal. VinUniversity’s published English requirements for undergraduate admission state that remotely delivered online tests are not valid, naming the Duolingo English Test alongside IELTS Indicator, IELTS Online and the TOEFL iBT Home Edition. VinUni accepts IELTS Academic 6.5, TOEFL iBT, PTE Academic 58, Cambridge 176 and VSTEP C1.

Treat that as the shape of the local picture: inside Vietnam, VSTEP, IELTS and TOEFL remain the currency, and only the institution’s own accepted-test table is worth trusting. The DET’s value for Vietnamese students is overwhelmingly outbound — it wins the offer from Melbourne, Toronto or Manchester, not the seat in a Hanoi programme. The same warning applies regionally: HKU and CUHK do not list DET, so a Hong Kong application needs IELTS or TOEFL.

Choosing your target score for the universities Vietnamese students apply to

The DET reports an overall score on the 10–160 scale in steps of five, plus four subscores — Literacy, Comprehension, Conversation and Production. Universities publish a minimum overall score, and many publish a minimum in each subscore too, which is where unprepared candidates are caught: an overall 120 with a Production of 95 fails a requirement that the headline number appears to meet.

Work backwards from the requirements on this page rather than aiming at a round number:

• 95–110 is the usual band for bachelor entry at many US state universities and at a range of Australian institutions.
• 110–125 covers most UK degree courses, where the requirement is often written as “overall 120, no subscore below 110”, and much of the Canadian intake.
• 120–135 is postgraduate and highly selective territory: 120 at Toronto, Waterloo, Queen’s and Ottawa, 125 at UBC and NYU, 130 at Duke, Cornell and Penn, 135 at Columbia.
• Australian institutions spread wider: Griffith around 110, Victoria University 105–120, ANU and Macquarie 115–120, Newcastle and Western Sydney 120 — but remember the subclass 500 visa will not take a DET score.

Pick the highest requirement on your shortlist and plan a comfortable margin above it, because subscore floors — not the overall number — are what most often send an application back. Send us your university’s English-requirements page on WhatsApp and we will read it with you before you start.

DET or IELTS from Vietnam?

Once acceptance is settled, the choice comes down to format and to what each exam is valid for.

IELTS is accepted by essentially everyone, including visa systems and institutions inside Vietnam that decline remotely delivered exams; the DET is accepted by more than 6,000 institutions abroad. If you have both an overseas application and a Vietnamese fallback, you may need both.

Visa and registration rules to check before you rely on DET

A university accepting your score and an immigration department accepting it are two different questions.

• Australia: universities may accept DET for admission, but the Department of Home Affairs does not accept it for the subclass 500 visa — that needs IELTS, TOEFL iBT, PTE Academic or another listed test.
• United Kingdom: DET is not a UKVI SELT. Degree-level admission is normally assessed by the university itself, but a pre-sessional or below-degree course can need a SELT.
• Canada: the Student Direct Stream ended in November 2024, so the regular study permit applies and your institution decides what English evidence it wants.

Get it in writing from admissions, and see our complete DET guide for score reporting.

Studying online from Vietnam

Studying with an academy in another time zone only works if nothing depends on your being awake at a particular hour. Every Teachero lesson is recorded, and you can review the recording afterwards, so a live session you cannot attend is never a session you lose.

Classes are taught fully in English by certified instructors who specialise in international English exams — the environment the DET asks you to perform in. Speaking and Writing are corrected personally, WhatsApp covers questions between sessions, and you sit full mock tests before the real thing. Arabic-language support is available for Arabic speakers.

Three shapes: the standard course (more days, fewer hours per day), the intensive course (fewer days, more hours per day) and the private tailored course, one-to-one around your weakest questions — see also our online course overview and DET FAQ.

Paying for the course from Vietnam

Your Teachero course is paid by card online (Visa or Mastercard) from any country. Many Vietnamese debit cards are domestic-only by default, and one toggle in your banking app fixes the decline; expect a 3-D Secure confirmation by SMS and a small foreign-currency margin.

Other options are available on WhatsApp. Schedules are set per round — message us for the next round’s details.