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Registered foreigners are counted across 192 nationalities.

Malaysia

People registered with Malaysia nationality number 5,406, which is 0.3% of all registered foreigners and ranks 24 in size. Compared with 2,330 in 2015, 10 years earlier, that is an increase of about 132%. They live in 186 districts, and the largest counts are Chungcheongbuk-do Eumseong-gun with 476, Seoul Yongsan-gu with 392, and Gyeongsangnam-do Geoje-si with 217. The index of dissimilarity (D) from Koreans is 0.557, the isolation index is 0.001, and interaction with Koreans is 0.942. The highest location quotient (LQ) is in Chungcheongbuk-do Eumseong-gun at 48, where this nationality is 0.5% of the foreigners in that district. The continent of origin is Southeast Asia. The largest age group is 25-29 at 16.4%, and men are 49.2%. This value alone is based on staying foreigners. Estimated mother tongues are Malay at 41.7% and Chinese at 20.5%.

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook on Immigration and Foreign Policy 2025 (registered foreigners by nationality, registered foreigners by nationality and district, registered foreigners by status of stay), staying foreigners by nationality and age

The index of dissimilarity, the isolation index, and the location quotient are calculated from the open dataset.

Table 1.Key indicators and benchmarks, 2025Unit: people, organizations, index

Year 2025

Indicators	Malaysia	All registered foreigners	Relative to total
Registered foreigners	5,406	1,604,920	0.3% of the total
Districts of residence	186	250	74.4% of the total
Index of dissimilarity (D)	0.557	0.280	rank 59 of 107
Isolation index	0.0009	0.045	rank 23 of 107
Interaction with Koreans	0.942	0.955	rank 101 of 107
Continent	Southeast Asia	602,559 (37.5% of the total)	0.9% of those from Southeast Asia

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (registered foreigners by nationality), segregation indicators from the open dataset.

Note: the dissimilarity index D measures how far a nationality's distribution across districts differs from that of Korean nationals; 0 means the two distributions match and 1 means complete separation. Isolation is the probability that a member meets someone of the same nationality, and interaction the probability of meeting a Korean resident. In the All registered foreigners column the three indices treat all registered foreigners as one group and use the same formulas. In the Relative to total column, rank 1 is the highest value among nationalities with 100 or more registered foreigners that year; in the continent row that column gives this nationality's share of all registered foreigners from the continent.

Figure 1.Malaysia nationals among registered foreigners, 2006–2025Unit: 10,000 persons

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook, each year.

Note: The vertical scale resets to the size of the selected nationality.

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Year	Malaysia	Vietnam
2006	704	52,157
2007	738	67,197
2008	852	79,848
2009	970	86,166
2010	1,051	98,225
2011	1,155	110,564
2012	1,295	114,211
2013	1,596	113,843
2014	2,083	122,571
2015	2,330	128,042
2016	2,297	137,769
2017	2,511	151,385
2018	3,388	170,707
2019	4,249	187,334
2020	3,532	181,415
2021	3,442	178,928
2022	3,612	196,883
2023	4,496	227,930
2024	5,134	261,581
2025	5,406	293,907

Table 2.Malaysia nationality, top 10 districts, 2025Unit: persons, %

Year 2025

Rank	District	Malaysia Nationality	Share of local foreigners
1	Chungcheongbuk-do Eumseong-gun	476	3.1
2	Seoul Yongsan-gu	392	3.0
3	Gyeongsangnam-do Geoje-si	217	1.3
4	Chungcheongnam-do Asan-si	192	0.8
5	Gyeonggi-do Ansan-si Danwon-gu	182	0.5
6	Seoul Dongdaemun-gu	169	0.8
7	Seoul Gwangjin-gu	164	0.9
8	Seoul Gwanak-gu	161	0.8
9	Gyeongsangbuk-do Chilgok-gun	160	2.7
10	Seoul Seongbuk-gu	156	1.0

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (registered foreigners by district and nationality).

Note: Nationwide, Malaysia nationals make up 0.3% of all registered foreigners, so an area whose share is above that holds relatively many of them.

Table 3.10 districts with the highest location quotient, 2025Unit: people, ratio, %

Year 2025

Rank	District	Malaysia Nationality	Location quotient (LQ)	Share of local foreigners
1	Chungcheongbuk-do Eumseong-gun	476	48.0	0.5
2	Gyeongsangnam-do Changnyeong-gun	134	23.2	0.2
3	Seoul Yongsan-gu	392	18.4	0.2
4	Chungcheongbuk-do Jincheon-gun	154	16.9	0.2
5	Gyeongsangbuk-do Chilgok-gun	160	14.5	0.2
6	Gyeongsangnam-do Geoje-si	217	8.9	0.1
7	Gyeonggi-do Anseong-si	132	6.4	0.1
8	Gyeonggi-do Ansan-si Danwon-gu	182	6.0	0.1
9	Chungcheongbuk-do Jeungpyeong-gun	23	6.0	0.1
10	Jeollanam-do Yeongam-gun	30	5.7	0.1

Source: Location quotient from the open dataset.

Note: the location quotient is the local share divided by the national share; above 1.5 counts as over-representation.

Table 4.By status of stay Malaysia nationality, 2025Unit: persons, %

Year 2025

Visa category	Persons	Share
Other(G1)	2,567	47.5
Student(D2)	1,079	20.0
Marriage Migration(F6)	336	6.2
Dependent Family(F3)	234	4.3
Specially Designated Activities(E7)	233	4.3
Other statuses(ETC)	170	3.1
General Trainee(D4)	160	3.0
Permanent Residence(F5)	156	2.9
Other statuses	471	8.7

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (registered foreigners by status of stay and nationality).

Note: The rows of this table add to 5,406, the whole of the Malaysia nationality.

Table 5.Age and sex, 2025Unit: persons, %

Year 2025

Age group	Total	Male	Female	Share
0-4	389	183	206	2.1
5-9	895	462	433	4.9
10-14	1,136	560	576	6.2
15-19	915	414	501	5.0
20-24	2,351	1,094	1,257	12.9
25-29	2,990	1,551	1,439	16.4
30-34	2,669	1,404	1,265	14.6
35-39	2,049	1,043	1,006	11.2
40-44	1,772	853	919	9.7
45-49	1,231	568	663	6.8
50-54	750	353	397	4.1
55-59	408	184	224	2.2
60+	669	293	376	3.7

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (staying foreigners by nationality and age).

Only this table counts all foreign residents, so it totals 18,224 rather than the 5,406 registered foreigners

Figure 2.Composition by age and sex, 2025Unit: %

Year 2025

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (staying foreigners by nationality and age).

Note: The bar length is the share each cell holds within the whole nationality. This figure alone uses staying foreigners, so its total differs from registered foreigners.

Figure 3.Change in status-of-stay composition, 2008–2025Unit: %

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook, each year (registered foreigners by status of stay and nationality).

Note: The share each status holds within this nationality in that year. The five largest statuses in 2025 are drawn.

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Year
2008	0.0	44.0	0.0	9.3	3.9
2009	0.0	45.3	0.0	10.8	4.2
2010	0.0	48.7	0.0	9.1	6.6
2011	0.0	47.3	0.0	11.3	8.3
2012	0.0	38.8	3.8	10.3	9.6
2013	0.0	34.0	4.4	10.8	9.3
2014	0.0	31.6	4.2	15.3	7.8
2015	0.0	32.2	4.5	15.6	8.2
2016	0.0	38.2	5.3	13.4	8.5
2017	16.4	36.2	5.1	8.5	8.2
2018	37.9	26.3	4.2	5.5	6.1
2019	52.4	19.7	3.8	3.6	4.5
2020	54.0	16.8	5.4	2.7	3.9
2021	46.0	20.8	7.2	2.6	4.0
2022	38.3	25.7	7.9	2.8	5.1
2023	47.4	20.9	6.7	2.8	4.8
2024	49.3	20.2	6.1	3.3	4.8
2025	47.5	20.0	6.2	4.3	4.3

Figure 4.Residential segregation and exposure over time, 2014–2025Unit: index

Indicators

Source: Segregation indicators from the open dataset.

Note: the dissimilarity index D measures how far a nationality's distribution across districts differs from that of Korean nationals, isolation is the probability that a member meets someone of the same nationality, and interaction the probability of meeting a Korean resident. The three run on different ranges, so they are selected one at a time.

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Year	Index of dissimilarity (D)	Isolation index	Interaction with Koreans
2014	0.631	0.001	0.966
2015	0.636	0.001	0.965
2016	0.617	0.000	0.969
2017	0.593	0.000	0.967
2018	0.605	0.001	0.958
2019	0.601	0.002	0.954
2020	0.547	0.001	0.961
2021	0.535	0.001	0.963
2022	0.520	0.001	0.961
2023	0.548	0.001	0.952
2024	0.546	0.001	0.946
2025	0.557	0.001	0.942

Table 6.Malaysia nationality, mother-tongue compositionUnit: %

First language		Share
Malay		41.7
Chinese		20.5
Kedah Malay		10.3
Tamil		7.5
Cantonese		5.8
Iban		3.0
Tagalog/Filipino		1.9
Kadazan Dusun		1.1

Source: Ethnologue 24th edition, first-language shares by country.

Note: the estimated demand on the language page is this share multiplied by the registered foreign population of each nationality. Shares below 0.5% are not listed, and a person who speaks more than one language is not distinguished.

Figure 5.By province, Malaysia nationality, 2025Unit: persons

Year 2025

Count range

Note: The boundaries are shapes simplified for display and are drawn as pen lines. The fill values are the provincial totals from the yearbook and do not depend on the shapes.

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (registered foreigners by nationality and district), summed to the province level.

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Province	Malaysia Nationality	Share of national
Seoul	1,750	32.4
Gyeonggi-do	1,020	18.9
Chungcheongbuk-do	699	12.9
Gyeongsangnam-do	519	9.6
Gyeongsangbuk-do	470	8.7
Chungcheongnam-do	295	5.5
Incheon	135	2.5
Busan	93	1.7
Jeju-do	71	1.3
Daejeon	66	1.2
Jeollanam-do	52	1.0
Gangwon-do	47	0.9
Jeollabuk-do	47	0.9
Gwangju	41	0.8
Ulsan	40	0.7
Daegu	37	0.7
Sejong	24	0.4