Pho first appeared in written records in which century?

Pho first appeared in written records in which century? 20th century. Written references to pho appear in the early 20th century, when the dish was emerging in northern Vietnam.

That timing helps distinguish pho from much older Vietnamese food traditions. Rice cultivation, rice noodles, herbs, and long-simmered broths all have deeper histories, but the specific dish called phở is generally treated as a modern creation. The earliest written evidence is associated with the period around the start of the 1900s, rather than with medieval or early-modern Vietnamese records.

The record is also incomplete because pho began as everyday street food. Foods sold by itinerant vendors were not always documented in the formal historical sources that survive, so the first written mention is not necessarily the exact moment the dish was invented. It is simply the earliest known documentation used by historians and reference works.

Another common confusion comes from early culinary influences. Chinese noodle traditions and French colonial beef consumption may have contributed to pho’s development, but evidence for those influences does not move pho’s first written appearances into the 18th or 19th century. The standard answer remains the 20th century.