The median monthly wage among Malaysian formal employees was RM3,027 in March 2026, according to DOSM’s first-quarter formal-sector wages release.
The reported employee count reached 7.05 million, up 3.8% from a year earlier. Kuala Lumpur recorded a median of RM4,527, followed by Selangor at RM3,445 and Penang at RM3,064.
Mining and quarrying had the highest sector median, at RM9,678, but represented just 0.5% of Malaysian formal employees. Agriculture’s median was RM2,327 and its share of employees was 1.8%.
Why the population covered matters
These figures describe Malaysian formal employees in the release—not every person working in Malaysia. They should not be relabelled as household income, graduate starting salaries or the earnings of informal workers.
The median is the middle of a distribution, rather than an arithmetic average. A high-paying but small sector therefore cannot be treated as representative of the typical worker. For employers comparing pay, the national figure is a starting point; the relevant sector and location provide more specific context.