Asia · South-Eastern Asia
How to draw Malaysia from memory
Malaysia comes in 2 separate pieces on the map. The main body is roughly as wide as it is tall; sketch that first, then place the smaller pieces relative to it. It ranks among the hardest countries to draw: the border carries far more detail than a freehand stroke can capture, so anything above 50 is a strong result.
- Difficulty
- hard
- Population
- 31.9 m
- Code
- MYS
Draw Malaysia
Practice · draw from memory
Malaysia
A four-step strategy for Malaysia
- 01
Start by fixing the overall footprint. Malaysia is close to square overall, so a lopsided sketch loses points fast.
- 02
Anchor one unmistakable feature — the straightest border section or the sharpest cape — and draw outward from it in a single continuous stroke.
- 03
Finish the main landmass completely, then add the remaining 1 piece as separate strokes. Scoring counts total covered area, so an unclosed island can hurt more than a missing one.
- 04
Submit, read the nine-sector grid, and redraw immediately. The sector readout names the region you under-drew, and a second attempt typically gains 10–20 points.
Top scores for Malaysia
Nobody has submitted a score for Malaysia yet. Draw it above and you are first on this board.
Full leaderboard →Quick facts
- Continent
- Asia
- Subregion
- South-Eastern Asia
- Outline pieces
- 2
- Detail score
- 10.59
Three things that go wrong when people sketch Malaysia
Each one is measured off the outline the game scores, not copied from a reference atlas: the proportions, the straight sections and the way the shape breaks into pieces are all properties of the coordinates your stroke gets compared against.
40% of the country is not the mainland
The outline is made of 2 separate pieces, and the largest one carries only 60% of the area. Sketched without the rest, the shape is short by that much even when the mainland is perfect — place the outlying piece first, then draw the mainland around it.
It narrows sharply toward the north
The outline is 3.4× wider at the bottom of the shape than at the top, so the broad part belongs in the south. Most failed sketches here put the wide section at the wrong end.
Malaysia is wider than it is tall
The finished outline holds a ratio of about 3.11 to 1, a horizontal shape. Most failed attempts come from defaulting to a squarish blob — and unlike position, aspect ratio is never normalised away by the scorer.
Answer key: the real shape of Malaysia
- Box on the canvas
- 440 × 141 units
- Width to height
- 3.11 : 1
- Separate landmasses
- 2
- Longest straight run
- Nothing over 8% of the perimeter
- Coast against silhouette
- 1.42× the wrapping outline
Open it after you have drawn Malaysia at least once. Seeing the shape first replaces the recall the score is meant to measure with tracing, and tracing always scores higher than remembering.
Why Malaysia is scored this way
Country Drawing does not compare your sketch to a picture of Malaysia. It scales and centres both your stroke and the real border into the same box, fills them, and measures how much of the two shapes overlap relative to their combined area. That means you are never punished for drawing Malaysia small, off to one side, or rotated slightly — only for getting the shape itself wrong. The nine-sector grid then splits the real border into a 3×3 mesh and reports coverage per cell, which is how it can tell you that you lost the whole coastline rather than just handing you a number.
Malaysia by the numbers
Malaysia covers 330,803 km², which makes it the 66th largest of 190 countries in the game and the 19th largest in Asia. The capital is Kuala Lumpur at about 3°N, 113°E, and it sits in South-Eastern Asia. It touches Brunei, Indonesia and Thailand, and 60% of its area sits in one main landmass. The rest of the perimeter is water.
Next to Malaysia: its land neighbours
Size is what the outline has to fill, so comparing the countries that share this border side by side is the fastest way to get the proportions into your head before you draw.
| Country | Area | Population | Capital | Pieces | vs Malaysia |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Malaysiathis page | 330,803 km² | 31.9 m | Kuala Lumpur | 2 | — |
 Brunei | 5,765 km² | 433 k | Bandar Seri Begawan | 2 | 0.02× |
 Indonesia | 1,904,569 km² | 270.6 m | Jakarta | 13 | 5.76× |
 Thailand | 513,120 km² | 69.6 m | Bangkok | 1 | 1.55× |
Draw these next
Countries near Malaysia share border conventions and coastline styles, which makes them the most useful follow-up practice.
Working through one country at a time is slow. Take the blank map of asia and label the whole region from memory — it shows you which neighbours you have never actually seen.
Malaysia drawing questions
How big is Malaysia?
Malaysia covers 330,803 km², ranking 66th of 190 countries here by land area and 19th in Asia. About 17% of the area of Indonesia.
What is the capital of Malaysia?
The capital is Kuala Lumpur at about 3°N, 113°E. The game scores the shape of the border rather than the position of any city, so the capital and its coordinates are here to help you place Malaysia on a blank map.
Is Malaysia hard to draw?
It is rated hard, and carries more outline detail than 93% of the 190 borders in this game. The shape has to be placed as 2 landmasses, with no straight edge longer than 8% of the perimeter to anchor it.
Which countries border Malaysia?
Malaysia shares a land border with Brunei, Indonesia and Thailand. The remaining perimeter is coast, which is the part that usually costs points.