According to the United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) Annual Human Development Report and global multidimensional poverty data published by the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI) in recent years, Vietnam has made encouraging achievements in human development and multidimensional poverty reduction. However, there still remain limitations in comparison to other countries in the region. Based on the UNDP’s Human Development Index (HDI) and OPHI’s Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) data, this article seeks to analyse, compare and contrast the MPI and HDI indicators of Vietnam with those of a number of other countries in Southeast Asia3 in order to clarify the trends of human development and reduction in multidimensional poverty in Vietnam compared to other countries in Southeast Asia in recent years.