Interesting fact that is often overlooked: when talking about the Islamic world, many imagine the Middle East. But in reality, the main Muslim countries are concentrated in a completely different place — in South and Southeast Asia.

I recently looked at some statistics and realized that the scale there is simply enormous. Indonesia alone has 242 million Muslims — more than the population of any European country. For comparison, that’s more than all the countries of the Middle East combined.

Here are the top countries by Muslim population:

Indonesia — 242M (87%)
Pakistan — 235M (96%)
India — 213M (15%)
Bangladesh — 150M (91%)
Nigeria — 124M (54%)
Egypt — 104M (95%)
Iran — 88M (99.8%)
Turkey — 84M (97%)
Sudan — 46M (99%)
Algeria — 43M (98%)
Iraq — 40M (98%)
Afghanistan — 39M (99.7%)
Ethiopia — 37M (31.3%)
Morocco — 37M (99%)
Yemen — 31M (99.1%)
Saudi Arabia — 29M (92.7%)
Uzbekistan — 28M (88%)
Tanzania — 22M (34.1%)
Malaysia — 21M (63.5%)
Syria — 20M (87%)
Mali — 20M (93.9%)
China — 25M (1.4%)
Niger — 25M (99.3%)
Somalia — 13M (99.8%)

Looking more closely at this map, it becomes clear: most of the largest Muslim countries by population are located in Asia, not the Middle East. This radically changes the understanding of where the main centers of Islamic civilization are concentrated.

Data from Pew Research Center (2025), source: Visual Capitalist. If you’re interested in exploring the demographics and geography of religions more deeply — it’s truly a fascinating topic.