Hanoi (VNA) – Vietnam secured the 44th position among 139 countries and economies in the Global Innovation Index (GII) 2025 Report that the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) released in Geneva, Switzerland on September 16.
Last year, the country was in the same position.
Vietnam continued to show progress in its innovation input ranking, climbing three places from 53rd in 2023 to 50th in 2025. Innovation inputs are assessed across five pillars: institutions, human capital and research, infrastructure, market sophistication, and business sophistication.
Meanwhile, Vietnam’s innovation output ranking which measures knowledge, technology, and creative outputs remained stronger than its input ranking, although it slipped one position compared with 2024, from 36th to 37th.
Vietnam also held its position as the second-ranked country in the group of lower-middle-income economies, just behind India, which stood at 38th.
Among upper-middle-income economies, three countries ranked higher than Vietnam: China (10th), Malaysia (34th), and Turkey (43rd). All other economies ahead of Vietnam are high-income, industrialised nations with significantly higher R&D expenditure-to-GDP ratios.
Within ASEAN, Vietnam outperformed Thailand to claim third place in the bloc, trailing only Singapore and Malaysia.
The GII 2025 further recognised Vietnam as one of the nine fastest-improving middle-income economies since 2013, alongside China, India, the Philippines, Indonesia, Iran, Morocco, and Albania.
Vietnam is also one of the only two countries worldwide (together with India) that have consistently outperformed their level of development in innovation for 15 consecutive years. This demonstrates Vietnam’s effectiveness in translating innovation inputs into measurable outputs.
In addition, Vietnam ranks among the top three countries globally with the fastest labour productivity growth between 2014 and 2024, along with China and Ethiopia.
Each year, WIPO publishes the Global Innovation Index (GII), one of the world’s most respected tools for assessing national innovation capacity. The index reflects how economies develop based on science, technology, and innovation (STI).
This year’s GII tracked innovation performance across 139 economies using 78 indicators from international public and private sources.
Switzerland remains the world's innovation leader in 2025. China enters the top 10 for the first time, while middle-income economies – India, Turkey, Viet Nam, the Philippines, Indonesia, Morocco, Albania and Iran – are the fastest climbers since 2013.
The GII provides governments with both an overview of their national innovation landscape and insights into strengths and weaknesses. For this reason, many countries use it as a policy reference tool for managing STI development and shaping national strategies. Examples include India, China, the Philippines, Colombia, and Brazil.
According to WIPO’s 2024 survey, 77% of member states (up more than 20% compared with 2022) reported using GII findings to design science, technology, and innovation policies.
In recent years, the Vietnamese Government has actively incorporated the GII as one of its key management and monitoring tools, assigning ministries, agencies, and localities with clear responsibilities to improve rankings. The Ministry of Science and Technology serves as the focal point for coordination.
Since 2017, Vietnam has steadily advanced on the index. From 59th place in 2016, the country climbed to 44th in 2024, and has successfully maintained this position in 2025./.
