Hoi An or Nha Trang?

Nha Trang has the more convenient beach. Its sandy crescent runs right along the town centre with a promenade behind it, so you go swimming on foot. There are also island bays by boat, and Doc Let to the north for pale, shallow water.

Hoi An's beach is good but sits outside town. An Bang is a bicycle ride through the paddies, and many visitors split their stay between the river and the coast. In both places the autumn monsoon closes the sea to easy swimming.

Hoi An eats more distinctively. Cao lau is found properly only here, and white rose dumplings and chicken rice make a short local menu worth seeking out. Market-to-kitchen cooking classes are a speciality of the town.

Nha Trang's strength is seafood grilled at the table and bowls of fish-cake noodle soup, with strong drip coffee on every block. Its tourist streets drift towards pizza and Russian dishes. In Hoi An the weak spot is the riverfront, where restaurants repeat the same menus.

There is a wide gap here. Hoi An's whole old town is the attraction: hundreds of wooden merchant houses, the covered Japanese Bridge and the ornate Fujian and Cantonese assembly halls. You need a day or two of slow walking, best at dawn or under the evening lanterns.

Nha Trang has a handful of separate sights instead. They are the Po Nagar Cham towers, still used for worship, the hilltop white Buddha at Long Son, the cathedral and the Yersin museum. Most of the town is modern hotel blocks, and that list makes one day.

Nha Trang has more to offer after dark. Bar crawls in the backpacker blocks behind the seafront, DJ nights and fire shows on the sand, and a few clubs open into the early hours give a proper resort night out, if not a sophisticated one.

Hoi An's evenings are for floating paper candles on the river and having a drink by the lanterns. A few loud bars on An Hoi islet stay open later, but the town goes quiet before midnight.

Both have equally good scenery, but it differs in kind. Hoi An's is flat and gentle: rice paddies by bicycle, basket boats in the Cam Thanh palm waterways, and the Cham Islands for snorkelling. The Hai Van Pass and Son Tra peninsula are within reach for more drama.

Nha Trang is all bay, with steep green islands offshore and mountains behind. Hon Mun is among Vietnam's best-known dive sites. Inland you can scramble up the Ba Ho waterfalls, and the main beach has kayaks and parasailing.

Hoi An is better placed for outings. My Son's jungle valley of Cham temples is about an hour away, and Da Nang offers the finest collection of Cham sculpture with the Marble Mountains' cave shrines on the way. Hue, though, needs an overnight stay.

From Nha Trang the only real heritage trip is two hours south to the Po Klong Garai towers and Cham pottery villages at Phan Rang. Dalat is too far for a day, so most visitors stay around the bay.

Both work about equally well for children, in different ways. Hoi An suits children who like making things and moving around: building a silk lantern, spinning in a basket boat, cycling through rice fields and wandering a small old town.

Nha Trang is about big days out. The beach is on the doorstep, and the Hon Tre island park has rides, a water park and an aquarium, and the mud baths are a hit too. Scooter traffic, broken pavements and midday heat are the drawbacks in both towns.

Hoi An is easier on foot. Long stretches of the old town are closed to motor traffic, and a borrowed bicycle covers the flat ride to the beach and villages. For My Son, Da Nang or the airport, though, you need a driver or ride-hailing.

In Nha Trang you can walk the seafront strip, but beyond it the pavements are crowded with parked scooters and crossing roads takes nerve. Ride-hailing and motorbike taxis do most of the work, and the airport at Cam Ranh is about 35km away.

Hoi An is far stronger, almost entirely because of its tailors. Hundreds of workshops make clothes, shoes and bags to measure within a couple of days, so allow time for fittings. Silk lanterns, ceramics and the An Hoi night market add to it.

Nha Trang's shopping is practical and local. The round Cho Dam market hall sells dried seafood, coffee and cashews, and the region is known for pearls and agarwood. Otherwise there are malls and beachwear shops.

Both are very cheap, with comfortable hotels with pools and street meals costing little in either town. The difference is where the money goes. In Hoi An it is the old town heritage ticket and the overpriced riverside restaurants. In Nha Trang it is the island amusement park, dive trips and seafood priced by weight, so check before ordering.

Neither town has much for a night of performance, but Hoi An has a little more. Visitors can join a game of bai choi, the sung folk game, see short folk music and dance shows at the traditional arts house, or watch the large outdoor history spectacle on the river.

Nha Trang has mostly cover bands in beach bars, plus occasional Cham music shows staged for tourists. For anything more substantial, from Hoi An you can go to Da Nang.

In Hoi An you unwind with a massage among the paddies. In Nha Trang it is a soak in warm mud. Hoi An has no bathing tradition, so relaxing here means massage rooms, yoga classes and resorts set among rice fields and palm groves, with days slowed to the pace of the bicycle.

Nha Trang's treat is half a day in warm mineral mud and hot spring pools near Thap Ba, and the resorts on the quieter bays have proper spas. In both towns the calmest stays are away from the centre, out of reach of Hoi An's evening crowds or Nha Trang's late scooter noise.