2018 Malaysian general election

General elections were held in Malaysia on Wednesday, 9 May 2018. At stake were all 222 seats in the Dewan Rakyat, the lower house of parliament. The 13th Parliament was dissolved by Prime Minister Najib Razak on 7 April 2018. It would have been automatically dissolved on 24 June 2018, five years after the first meeting of the first session of the 13th Parliament of Malaysia on 24 June 2013.

In an unprecedented victory, the Pakatan Harapan (PH) coalition, which had been the country's federal opposition prior to the elections, won a majority in the Dewan Rakyat together with the Sabah Heritage Party (WARISAN), with PH and WARISAN together winning 121 seats. The elections marked the first time in Malaysia's history that the ruling party was voted out of power. The Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition had previously enjoyed an uninterrupted reign over the country since Malaya's independence in 1957, but this came to an end following the elections. PH's leader, Mahathir Mohamad, who previously served as Malaysia's Prime Minister from 1981 to 2003, was sworn in for the second time on 10 May, a day after the elections. At 93 years of age, Mahathir was also the world's oldest elected head of government. Barisan Nasional (BN), led by Najib, held onto 79 seats and became the new federal opposition, along with Gagasan Sejahtera (GS), which won 18 seats. The United Sabah Alliance (USA) won one seat, while three seats were won by independent politicians. The elections were widely regarded as one of the greatest political upsets worldwide in 2018.

In the simultaneous state elections held for 12 of the state legislative assemblies, PH retained Penang and Selangor with larger majorities, while gaining Negeri Sembilan, Malacca, Johor, Kedah and Perak from BN. WARISAN also seized Sabah from BN, which retained only two states – Perlis and Pahang. GS held onto Kelantan while gaining Terengganu from BN. State-level elections were not held in Sarawak, as the state had held its elections separately in 2016. However, as a consequence of the elections, Sarawak-based BN component parties left the coalition to form Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS), thereby taking over the state from BN.

Following the elections, Mahathir secured a royal pardon for the jailed PH leader, Anwar Ibrahim, and indicated that he would give way to the latter within the next few years. Meanwhile, Najib resigned as BN's chairman on 12 May and was succeeded as Leader of the Opposition by his party colleague, Ahmad Zahid Hamidi. Investigations within Malaysia into the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) scandal, which had been halted during Najib's tenure, were resumed in the aftermath of the elections, resulting in several ongoing criminal indictments against the former Prime Minister. However, PH only ruled for 22 months before collapsing in the 2020 Malaysian political crisis, to be replaced by a new Government named Perikatan Nasional, led by Muhyiddin Yassin. Perikatan Nasional would itself collapse after 17 months, with Barisan Nasional taking power and Ismail Sabri Yaakob becoming prime minister.