One mistake costs UKM candidates more time than every margin and font rule combined: formatting the reference list in APA. Gaya UKM is not APA. It looks close enough that you will not notice until the thesis comes back.
This page sets out the UKM thesis format requirements in force at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia as of September 2026, read from the university’s own guideline rather than from a template passed down between students. Margins are drawn to scale, and the Word settings are given so you can set them up before you write another paragraph.
Your UKM page, drawn to scale
Most formatting errors are margin errors, and most margin errors come from setting all four sides the same. Here is what a Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia thesis page actually looks like:
Your UKM page, drawn to scale. The 3.8 cm left margin is the binding edge — wider than the other three so the text is not swallowed when the thesis is bound. Setting all four margins the same is the commonest formatting error we see.
Set your UKM thesis up in Word first
Retrofitting margins and spacing into a finished 200-page document is miserable. Setting them correctly at the start costs ten minutes. Copy these values straight across:
| Top | 3 cm |
| Bottom | 2.5 cm |
| Left | 3.8 cm |
| Right | 2.5 cm |
| Paper size | A4 |
| Typeface | Times New Roman, 12 pt (Traditional Arabic 16 for Jawi and Arabic script) |
| Body text | 1.5 |
Do this before you write another paragraph. If you are already deep into the thesis, fix it now anyway — the longer you leave it, the more your tables, figures and page breaks will shift when the margins finally change.
UKM thesis length limits
Abstract requirements
Length: 200–300 words.
Languages: Bahasa Malaysia placed before English for theses written in English or Arabic.
Every Malaysian university on this list requires both a Bahasa Malaysia and an English abstract, regardless of which language the thesis itself is written in. Where they differ is the order and the word count, and both are checked.
Referencing style
Gaya UKM — UKM’s own author–date house style. Not APA.
Turnitin and similarity
Binding and cover colour
For examination: 7 soft-bound.
Final submission: At least 2 hardbound + CD-ROM.
Check the cover specification before you pay the binder. Binders print exactly what you hand them, and a wrong-coloured cover is an expensive reprint rather than a quick fix.
What trips people up at UKM
1. Gaya UKM is not APA, and Mendeley will not save you
UKM uses its own author–date house style. It resembles APA closely enough that candidates format the whole reference list in APA, submit, and get it back. UKM’s own Graduate Centre publishes a separate “common mistakes” companion document largely because of this. Format from the Gaya UKM guide itself — not from your reference manager’s APA output, and not from a template a friend used at another university.
2. 1.5 spacing, not double
UKM is the only one of the five that does not use double spacing for body text. If you inherited a template from a UM or UPM friend, the spacing is wrong.
3. Seven softbound copies for examination
The highest of the five by a wide margin. Budget for it — UM asks for two.
4. The top margin is 3.0 cm
Also unusual. Four of the five use 2.0 or 2.5 cm at the top; UKM uses 3.0.
5. No published similarity threshold
Turnitin screening is verified by your faculty or institute rather than against a university-wide number. Ask for the figure in writing.
A note on sourcing. UKM’s own site could not be reached when we compiled this, so these figures come from hosted copies of the official Gaya UKM document. The margins and binding requirements were confirmed across two independent copies. The line spacing, word limits and abstract length rest on a single copy — check those against the university’s own PDF before you rely on them for a submission.
The rule that overrides everything on this page. Your faculty can be stricter than your university, and frequently is. Confirm three things in writing with your own faculty before you submit: the word limit, the similarity cap, and the referencing style. Those three are where faculty-level overrides almost always live. Margins, paper and binding colour are set centrally and rarely vary.
If you take one thing from this page, take the referencing. Margins are a ten-minute fix at any stage. Re-formatting three hundred references from APA into Gaya UKM after your thesis comes back is a week you will not get again.
UKM thesis format compared with the other Malaysian universities
If you are moving between universities — a Master’s at one and a PhD at another, which is extremely common in Malaysia — the assumptions you carry across are usually wrong. Our
side-by-side comparison of all five universities puts every number in one table.
- UiTM thesis format requirements
- IIUM thesis format requirements
- UTAR thesis format requirements
- MMU thesis format requirements
- UNIMAS thesis format requirements
- UM thesis format — Universiti Malaya
- UPM thesis format — Universiti Putra Malaysia
- USM thesis format — Universiti Sains Malaysia
- UTM thesis format — Universiti Teknologi Malaysia
Want your UKM thesis to pass format checking the first time?
We work with postgraduate researchers at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia on structure, formatting compliance and getting a manuscript through format checking without a return — on your own work, to your own faculty’s specification.
Source: Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Panduan Penulisan Tesis — Gaya UKM (2015 printing of the 2010 revision), Pusat Siswazah —
www.ukm.my/pusatsiswazah/thesis-templates-and-guidlines.
Read as published in September 2026. Guidelines are revised without notice and faculties may impose stricter requirements — always confirm against your own faculty before submission. If you spot something that has changed, tell us and we will update this page.