Vietnam e-commerce market is still growing. But the distribution of that growth is becoming more selective.
But fewer sellers are capturing that growth.
In 2025, GMV across Shopee, TikTok Shop, Lazada and Tiki grew 26% YoY, while the number of revenue-generating sellers fell 5.6%. Average revenue per seller, meanwhile, increased 33%. So this is not simply a story of a shrinking market. It is a story of where growth is going.
Growth is becoming harder to capture
The same shift is visible in Vietnam e-commerce market in H1 2026. E-commerce GMV across the four major platforms grew 19% YoY, while the number of revenue-generating shops continued to decline.
At the same time, the economics are becoming less forgiving.
In Q4 2025, consumption volume declined 8% YoY, while average selling price increased 33%. Platform fee pressure contributed to higher selling prices, while consumers became increasingly sensitive to price.
The implication is subtle but important: Market growth does not mean equal opportunity for every seller. Some businesses are better positioned to capture that growth than others.
Value is becoming more concentrated
One signal is the growing weight of established and trusted sellers. In 2025, Mall shops represented only around 2% of shops on Shopee and TikTok Shop, yet accounted for more than 30% of their revenue.
This does not mean only large brands can win. But it does suggest that simply being present on a platform is becoming less valuable.
The ability to operate through higher costs, stronger competition and more selective consumers matters more. The changing economics of the Vietnam e-commerce market also affect how brands think about scale.
When economics get harder, breadth needs to justify itself
When a market is growing quickly, adding more can feel like the obvious answer.
More SKUs.
More variants.
More listings.
More campaigns.
But every addition also creates complexity.
When economics tighten, that complexity needs to earn its place.
So the question is not necessarily:
Should we have fewer products?
It is:
Which parts of the business deserve more investment?
That changes how I would look at three familiar marketplace problems.
1. Know which products actually carry the business.
Not every SKU deserves the same level of attention. Some products generate meaningful revenue and have the economics to support further investment.
Others may sell, but consume disproportionate attention across inventory, content, promotion and operations.
The answer is not to blindly cut the long tail. It is to understand where the business is actually being carried — and concentrate resources accordingly.
Focus is not having fewer products. It is giving more of what you have to the products that matter most.
2. Protect the signals that help consumers choose.
The same principle applies to conversion.
When consumers become more selective, weak trust signals become harder to ignore. Reviews, product information and seller credibility can all reduce uncertainty at the point of choice.
So when growth gets harder, the answer is not always more traffic. Sometimes the more productive question is:
What is preventing the demand we already have from converting?
That is why fixing weak reviews or other trust signals should not be treated simply as marketplace hygiene. It is part of protecting the value already created.
3. Question whether every variant is worth its complexity.
A variant can generate sales and still create more complexity than its economics justify. Each additional variant can add inventory decisions, content, forecasting, promotion and operational work. So the question is not simply:
Can this variant sell?
It is:
Is it worth the complexity it creates?
The question of what deserves to scale becomes even more important when a category has limited room for assortment expansion. It means being deliberate about what deserves to be scaled when resources are finite. The harder decision is what not to scale.
The same principle applies to growth investment more broadly: more activity does not automatically mean more incremental business impact. This is where the market shift becomes more interesting.
The opportunity is not necessarily to do less. It is to become more selective about where effort creates value.
That means deciding:
What should we invest in?
What should we defend?
What should we stop scaling?
Those are not just marketplace questions. They are resource-allocation decisions. And when growth becomes harder to capture, resource allocation becomes part of the growth strategy itself.
Vietnam’s e-commerce market is still growing. But perhaps the bigger question is no longer how much more we can add.
It is:
What deserves more of what we already have?
