The collection includes The King Ram Khamhaeng's Inscription, which was inscribed on UNESCO's Memory of the World Programme registered in 2003 in recognition of its significance.

[3] Other than preserving and displaying Thai artifacts dating from the Dvaravati, Srivijaya, to Sukhothai and Ayutthaya periods, the museum also displays extensive collections of regional Asian Buddhist Arts such as Indian Gandhara, Chinese Tang, Vietnamese Cham, Indonesian Java, and Cambodian Khmer arts.

The National Museum is on the grounds of the former Wang Na, the "Front Palace" which was built for the vice king, a sort of crown prince (Thailand has no law of primogeniture.

[5] In 1874, Chulalongkorn ordered the establishment of the first public museum at the Concordia Pavilion inside the Grand Palace to exhibit the collections of his father and other objects of general interest.

This repatriation was a rare victory for Thailand in its efforts to recover thousands of artifacts which have been looted or trafficked.