Countries
Key facts
- Capital
- Kuala Lumpur
- Region
- Asia, South-Eastern Asia
- Population
- 35,977,838 (2025)
- Area
- 329,750 km²
- Currency
- Malaysian ringgit (MYR)
- Languages
- Malay (macrolanguage), English, Chinese, Tamil, Telugu
- Calling code
- +60
- Internet domain
- .my
- ISO codes
- MY, MYS, 458
- Time zone
- UTC+8:00 to UTC+8:00
- United Nations
- Member state
- Postal code pattern
- ##### (# = digit, @ = letter)
Land and position
Malaysia covers about 329,750 square kilometres. By area it ranks 67th among the 250 countries and territories on this site. It is a little smaller than Finland and a little larger than Vietnam. It shares a land border with 3 neighbours: Brunei, Indonesia, Thailand. Its centre lies at about 2° north, 112° east, in the northern hemisphere.
Neighbours
People
About 36 million people live in Malaysia (World Bank, 2025). That makes it the 45th most populous of the 246 places on this site with a figure, with about 0.44 percent of the world's people. On average there are 109 people to each square kilometre. About 77 percent of people live in towns and cities (World Bank, 2025). A baby born there can expect to live about 77 years (World Bank, 2024). Languages listed for it: Malay (macrolanguage), English, Chinese, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Panjabi, Thai. A person from Malaysia is called Malaysian.
Money and economy
The currency is the Malaysian ringgit (code MYR, symbol RM). The World Bank puts the size of its economy (GDP) at about US$ 472 billion (2025), which is about US$ 13,125 for each person (2025).
Time
Malaysia spans 2 time zone areas, from UTC+8:00 to UTC+8:00. Clocks stay the same all year: there is no daylight saving time.
Time now in Kuala Lumpur: loading
Offsets are for January 2026. See Time Zones for a converter.
Largest cities
| City | People |
|---|---|
| Kuala Lumpur | 1,453,975 |
| Johor Bahru | 858,118 |
| Kampung Baru Subang | 833,571 |
| Petaling Jaya | 807,879 |
| Ipoh | 759,952 |
| Shah Alam | 740,750 |
City figures are from GeoNames and count the city itself, not the wider urban area. They can be some years old, so use them to see the order of size.
More in South-Eastern Asia
Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Timor-Leste, Vietnam. See the whole region.
Figures were collected on 11 November 2026 from the World Bank, GeoNames and the open countries data set. See About and data sources. Borders and names follow those sources and do not express any view on disputed territory.