This dataset has been collected thanks to the long-term partnership with Department of Agricultural Land Management (DALaM), Lao PDR, which granted the permission for field access, and to the financial, scientific, technical, and/or logistical support of the Multiscale TROPIcal CatchmentS (SNO M-TROPICS; https://mtropics.obs-mip.fr/) critical zone observatory (previously MSEC). This shapefile dataset includes soil types, following the USDA Soil Taxonomy, of the Houay Pano catchment, northern Lao PDR. The map was built by the Soil Survey Staff of the National Agriculture and Forestry Research Institute (NAFRI) in 1998. The authors acknowledge the financial support of the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the International Water Management Institute (IWMI), the Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD), the National Agriculture and Forestry Research Institute (NAFRI) in Lao PDR, the Soil Survey and Land Classification Center in Lao PDR, and the French Centre National de Recherche Scientifique (ECCO project “Dynamique et stabilisation des matières organiques dans des sols tropicaux: influence des brûlis, de l’érosion et de la mise en culture”).