As a punishment for the retaliation against Siamese Kingdom, King Rama III ordered Syburi (Kedah) to be divided into four separate mueangs: Kubang Pasu, Syburi, Perlis, and Satun in 1833.

In 1897, King Chulalongkorn (Rama V) reunified the four cities under the newly established Monthon (มณฑล) Syburi.

[1] Neighboring districts are (from the northwest clockwise) Tha Phae, Khuan Don of Satun Province, the state Perlis of Malaysia and the Andaman Sea.

Also some parts of the boundary area with Malaysia is protected in the Thale Ban National Park.

Satun's location permits it to host Thailand's landing points for optical fiber submarine communications cable Segment FEA (FLAG Europe Asia) of the 28,000-kilometer-long FLAG (Fiber-Optic Link Around the Globe); and for the 49,000-kilometer-long SEA-ME-WE 3, which links regions of Southeast Asia to the Middle East and Western Europe.