Kamus Dewan Perdana, the Malay dictionary of Malaysia's Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka (DBP), defines kakak as 「saudara perempuan yang lebih tua」, an older sister, so an older brother is abang. Indonesia's dictionary, the KBBI, defines kakak as 「saudara tua」, an older sibling, and abang as 「kakak laki-laki」, an older brother who is a kakak. The same word for the same person is right in one country and odd in the other.
We set the two dictionaries side by side for the Malay and Indonesian family words a reader is likely to meet, using the first sense each shows. Most agree. Kakak, bibi, buyut and the words for cousins and in-laws are where they part.
A parent's younger sister is bibi in the Indonesian dictionary
The KBBI's entry for bibi gives 「adik perempuan dr ayah atau ibu; makcik」, a parent's younger sister, and keeps a separate word, uak, for the older sister. Kamus Dewan Perdana gives bibi a different first sense, 「panggilan kepada perempuan yang sudah bersuami」, a way to address a married woman. Its later senses sit behind the portal's free login, which we did not use, so we cannot say whether it also lists an aunt.
Other aunt and uncle words do agree. Kamus Dewan Perdana defines paman as 「bapa saudara」 and tante as 「emak saudara」, uncle and aunt, and the KBBI has the same meanings, marking om and tante as colloquial. Pak cik is narrower in Malay: Kamus Dewan Perdana gives it to the second-youngest or youngest uncle, while the KBBI's pakcik is a parent's younger brother. Kamus Dewan Perdana defines mak cik as 「panggilan kepada perempuan yang sudah separuh umur」, a way to address a middle-aged woman.
The KBBI also records words used in particular communities, with labels. Koko is 「panggilan untuk kakak laki-laki dalam keluarga Tionghoa」, an older brother in a Chinese-Indonesian family. Uni is a Minangkabau older sister, teteh and akang are Sundanese, and tulang, labelled Batak, is 「saudara laki-laki dari ibu」, a mother's brother. Those are the KBBI's entries; we did not check the regional languages themselves.
A great-grandparent's parent is a buyut in Kamus Dewan Perdana
Kamus Dewan Perdana defines buyut as 「ibu atau bapa kepada moyang」, the parent of a great-grandparent, four generations up. The KBBI's buyut gives that sense with a Riau label, gives a Javanese sense three generations up, and gives a second Javanese sense going the other way, a grandchild's child. The two dictionaries agree on cicit, a grandchild's child, and broadly on piut: Kamus Dewan Perdana calls it 「keturunan yang kelima, iaitu cucu kepada cucu seseorang」, the fifth descent counting oneself, a grandchild's grandchild, and the KBBI 「generasi kelima atau keturunan keempat」.
A second cousin is dua pupu in Kamus Dewan Perdana
Malay counts cousins with pupu. Kamus Dewan Perdana defines dua pupu as 「hubungan dua saudara yang ibu atau bapa mereka mempunyai hubungan sepupu」, two people whose parents are first cousins, and tiga pupu as 「perhubungan persaudaraan antara orang yang moyang mereka adik-beradik」, people whose great-grandparents were siblings. The KBBI has no entry for dua pupu. Its cousin words are sepupu, 「saudara senenek; anak dari dua bersaudara; saudara misan」, and misan, which in a sense it labels Javanese reaches one generation further, 「keturunan ketiga dari satu nenek」.
A spouse's parent is mentua in Kamus Dewan Perdana and mertua in the KBBI
Both dictionaries use ipar for in-laws of one's own generation. Kamus Dewan Perdana defines ipar as 「adik-beradik sebelah isteri atau suami sendiri」, a spouse's siblings, and abang ipar as 「lelaki yang dikahwini oleh kakak seseorang」, the man an older sister married. The KBBI gives ipar both ways, a spouse's sibling and a sibling's spouse. Besan, the parents of one's child's spouse, and menantu, a child's spouse, match. For a spouse's parents Kamus Dewan Perdana's headword is mentua, 「ibu bapa kepada isteri atau suami」, and the KBBI's is mertua, which marks mentua as non-standard.
A wife's older brother came back as a blood brother on our tool
Until 2 October 2026, our Malay and Indonesian family term finder computed most relationships from rules, and the rules lost the marriage. Asked for a wife's older brother, or a younger brother's wife, it answered with the words for a brother or sister. With the country set to Indonesia, 47 of its 74 computed two-step answers came back in Malay words. It gave "kakak lelaki" as standard Malay for an older brother, called Pak Teh the middle uncle, used bibi for a parent's older sister, and printed cousin terms, "sepupu sekali" and "sepupu darjah 2", that are not recorded in either dictionary. Its Singapore and Brunei settings changed nothing. It now takes each word from Kamus Dewan Perdana or the KBBI with a link to the entry, uses ipar for in-laws, never shows a Malay word on its Indonesian setting, and says so when neither dictionary has a single word.
We did not check Malay as used in Singapore or Brunei separately.
The middle child is a teh in only one family size
Malay families often call siblings, and their parents' siblings, by birth-order titles. Kamus Dewan Perdana defines long as the eldest, ngah as the second and alang as the third when there are more than three children, then defines the rest with overlaps: teh is the fourth or the sixth, andak the fourth or the fifth, anjang the sixth or the seventh, cik the second-youngest or youngest, and su the youngest.
We applied those definitions to every position in families of two to ten children, 54 positions in all. Twenty-three positions get exactly one title, twenty-three get two, seven get three, and one gets four: the fourth of five children can be uda, andak, teh or cik. Pak Teh is often explained as the middle uncle, but the middle child of a family of three, five, seven or nine is a teh only in the family of seven.
The titles are not only Malaysian. The KBBI records several of them, andak among them, under labels for the Malay spoken in Indonesia: andak as 「anak yang keenam」, the sixth child, in the Malay of Riau, where Kamus Dewan Perdana has the fourth or fifth; along as 「panggilan untuk anak sulung」, the eldest, in the Malay of Kalimantan; and busu, for a parent's youngest sibling, in the Malay of Jambi.
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