UTAR Thesis Format Requirements | 5 cm Margin, Spacing & Turnitin

UTAR’s 20% similarity limit is the easy part. The rule that actually fails theses is the one underneath it: no single source above 1%, and no matching run longer than eight words. A thesis sitting at 12% overall can still be sent back.

This page sets out the UTAR thesis format requirements in force at Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman, read from the Institute of Postgraduate Studies and Research (IPSR)’s own documents rather than from a template passed between students. The margins below are drawn to scale, and the Word settings are listed so you can set them before you write another paragraph.

Binding margin5 cm

Line spacingDouble

Similarity20% / 1% per source

Hard bindingOptional

The UTAR thesis page, drawn to scale

Margins are where most format rejections start, because a wrong one is invisible on screen and obvious the moment someone measures it. Here is what a UTAR page actually looks like:

Five centimetres on the binding edge — wider than any other university on this site, and double the right margin. Set it before you write: reflowing a finished thesis from 2.5 cm to 5 cm moves every table, figure and page break you have already placed.

Set this up in Word before you write another page

Changing margins on a finished thesis moves every table, figure and page break you have already positioned. Doing it first costs five minutes; doing it last can cost a weekend.

UTAR · Word page setup

Paper size	A4, 80 gsm, single-sided
Top margin	2.5 cm
Bottom margin	2.5 cm
Left margin	5 cm — the widest in Malaysia
Right margin	2.5 cm, justified
Font	Times New Roman, 12 pt
Line spacing	Double
Between paragraphs	Four line spaces
Appendices	10 pt at 1.5 spacing

How long the thesis should be

Master’s20,000 – 60,000 by research

PhD40,000 – 100,000

These are word counts for the main chapters. References, appendices, tables and figures sit outside the count at every university on this list — which is worth knowing before you start cutting a chapter you did not need to cut.

The similarity limit

Where UTAR draws the line on Turnitin similarity.

20%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

The similarity rule has three parts, not one. UTAR checks three things, and the headline percentage is the most forgiving of them. Overall similarity must be 20% or below. Each individual source must contribute under 1%. And no matching block may run longer than eight words. Quotes and the bibliography are excluded from the first two. In practice the eight-word rule is what catches careful writers — a standard definition quoted properly still registers as a run.

Cover and binding

MASTER’S

Maroon

PhD

Black

What catches UTAR students out

Four line spaces between paragraphs

On top of double-spaced text. No Word default produces this, and it is the single most-missed UTAR rule.

Page 1 of Chapter 1 is counted but not printed

Visible numbering resumes at 2. Preliminary pages use lowercase Roman numerals.

Your citation style depends on your faculty

Arts, Social Science, Management and Finance use APA. Engineering, Science, Medicine and ICT use Harvard. Chinese Studies uses Chicago — it changed from APA in Rev 6, so older advice is wrong.

Hard binding is optional at UTAR

Unusual in Malaysia. If you do want hardbound copies, IPSR must verify them first.

Appendices are 10 pt at 1.5 spacing

Different from the body text. So are footnotes, at no less than 8 pt.

Two versions of the guidelines are live

Rev 5 (2018) and Rev 6 (2020) are both downloadable and both rank in search. Check the cover page — confusingly, Rev 6’s running headers still say Rev 5.

Before you submit

Read your own faculty’s supplementary notes as well as the university guideline. Several UTAR requirements are set at faculty level rather than centrally, and the faculty version wins. If anything on this page conflicts with what your supervisor or graduate office tells you, follow them — guidelines are revised more often than pages like this one are.

Source documents:

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Want this done for you? We format postgraduate theses to Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman requirements — margins, headings, captions, table of contents, reference list, the lot — and return a document that passes format check first time. Message us on WhatsApp and tell us your deadline.