Malays, Orang Asli, some Bumiputera of Sabah and Sarawak, and Malaysian Indians adopt patronymic naming customs.
On the other hand, Malaysian Chinese, some Malays and Bumiputera of Sabah and Sarawak use family names.
Although traditional Malay names were still widely used for centuries afterward, they are now primarily confined to rural areas.
The Department additionally bans names with the meaning of colors, animals and natural phenomena.
This effectively renders many traditional names illegal including Puteh or Putih (white), Bulan (moon), Suria (sun), Rimau (tiger) and Awan (cloud).
Because of these restrictions, the vast majority of Malays today tend to favour Arabic names.
In pre-modern times, words and names of Arabic derivation were adapted to suit the Classical Malay language.
For men, the patronym consists of the title bin (from the Arabic بن, meaning 'son of') followed by his father's personal name.
For women, the patronym consists of the title binti (from the Arabic بنت, meaning 'daughter of') followed by her father's name.
As of January 2022, the longest recorded name for a Malaysian is 'Princess Aura Nurr Ermily Amara Auliya Bidadari Nawal El-Zendra', comprising 63 letters including spaces.
[1] Some are taken from public figures around the world, such as Mohammad Rifae Zidane, whose third personal name is taken from the famous footballer.
For example, the daughter of actor Scha Alyahya and Awal Ashaari, named Lara Alana, faced criticism from Malaysians because "Lara" means "painful" in Malay, although it means "protector" in Latin.
[2] The patronymic is employed by almost all Malays in accordance with local customs as well as ones adopted from the Arabs, historically Jews and others.
that the Mr or Mrs form of address is not compatible with the Malay naming system, probably due to the lack of family or surnames.
In olden times, the first group of Chinese people in Malaysia used to be held in high regard by Malays.
Some Malays in the past may have taken the word "Baba", referring to Chinese males, and put it into their name, when this used to be the case.
This seems to have been developed in response to the use of very popular Muslim names, like Muhammad and Ahmad for men, and Nur and Siti for women.
An example is Datuk Lee Chong Wei, a famous badminton player who was awarded the title as recognition to his achievement in becoming the third Malaysian to win a silver Olympic medal 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics.
The title 'Tun' is reserved for nationally important persons, like the fourth Prime Minister of Malaysia Tun Mahathir bin Mohamad.
These names are usually represented as three words, for example Foo Li Leen or Tan Ai Lin.
As no formal system of romanisation is imposed on Chinese names in Malaysia at the time of birth registration, names are often romanised according to the judgment of the registration clerk or according to the preference of the proposer.
However, most of the new generation indigenous people in Sabah and Sarawak who live in town areas and who practice Christianity as a religion, tend to have a Christian first name, for example Melissa Melanie Raweng (Raweng being the father's name).
In fact, Arabs and Portuguese have common denominator in influence in names: Fatima, Omar, and Soraya.