Religious myth: Most Muslims are Arabs - not true!

The estimates vary, but most agree that there are about 1.5 billion Muslims in the world; nearly one-fourth of the world’s population today. The Muslim population is a diverse community of believers spanning the globe. Over fifty countries have Muslim-majority populations, while other groups of believers are clustered in minority communities on nearly every continent.

Although Islam is often associated with the Arab world and the Middle East, fewer than 15% of Muslims are Arab.

By far, the largest populations of Muslims live in Southeast Asia (more than 60%), while the countries of the Middle East and North Africa make up only 20% of the total. One-fifth of the world's Muslims live as minorities in non-Muslim countries, with the largest of these populations in India, China, and Russia.

Country Number of Muslims
Indonesia 203 million
Pakistan 174 million
India 161 million
Bangladesh 145 million
Egypt 79 million
Nigeria 78 million
Iran 74 million
Turkey 74 million
Algeria 34 million
Morocco 32 million
Iraq 30 million
Sudan 30 million
Afghanistan 28 million
Ethiopia 28 million
Uzbekistan 26 million
Saudi Arabia 25 million
Yemen 23 million
China 22 million
Syria 20 million
Russia 16 million