Asia contains the majority of the world’s Muslims, but a strict “Top 10 Muslim countries in Asia” depends on how Asia is defined. Demographic organizations often separate the Middle East and North Africa from the Asia-Pacific region even though many Middle Eastern countries are geographically in Asia.
Spiritual Culture therefore avoids presenting one boundary-dependent Top 10 as if it were universal. The strongest comparable evidence comes from Pew Research Center’s 2020 country estimates.
The four largest Muslim populations are all in Asia
| Country | Muslim population in 2020 | Share of national population |
|---|---|---|
| Indonesia | about 239.0 million | 87.0% |
| Pakistan | about 226.9 million | 96.5% |
| India | about 213.1 million | 15.2% |
| Bangladesh | about 151.4 million | 91.1% |
These are not merely Asia’s largest Muslim populations; they were the four largest national Muslim populations in the world in Pew’s 2020 estimates.
Iran and Turkey are also major Muslim-population countries
Pew estimated approximately 87.5 million Muslims in Iran and 83.6 million in Turkey in 2020. Both countries are geographically transcontinental or regionally classified in ways that vary across datasets. A country list can therefore change depending on the regional framework being used.
Afghanistan, Central Asia, and West Asia
Large Muslim populations also live in Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Iraq, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, and other parts of Central and West Asia. Their precise position in an “Asian Top 10” changes depending on whether a source treats the Middle East as part of Asia for statistical presentation.
This is why the older article’s inclusion of the United Arab Emirates as a top-ten Asian Muslim population was misleading: the UAE has a strong Islamic national identity but a much smaller total population than several Asian countries with tens of millions of Muslims.
Asia is not one Islamic culture
Islamic life in Indonesia, Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Iran, Turkey, Central Asia, and the Arabian Peninsula developed through different languages, empires, legal schools, Sufi networks, trade routes, colonial histories, and modern states.
Indonesia and Bangladesh are predominantly Sunni, Iran is predominantly Twelver Shia, and India contains large Sunni and Shia communities within a Hindu-majority society. Central Asian countries also carry the legacy of Soviet religious policy, while Southeast Asian Islam developed through maritime trade and local networks.
Count, percentage, and religious influence answer different questions
A country can have a very high Muslim percentage but a modest population, or a vast Muslim population that remains a national minority. Neither number measures scholarship, pilgrimage importance, mosque attendance, or the historical role a place has played in Islamic civilization.
For that reason, use this page for demographic context and our Islam section for belief, practice, history, and living traditions.
