Malaysia
Regulated and taxed since Act 852 — with a live proposal to ban open-system vapes.
- Nicotine limit
- No explicit cap; products must be registered
- Flavours
- No general flavour ban
- Online sales
- Restricted; enforcement against online sellers is active
- Tax
- Excise duty on vape liquid, plus registration and certification costs
- Personal import
- Personal use only
- Status
- Restricted
Malaysia went from essentially unregulated to one of the region’s more structured markets in a single legislative step, and it is still moving.
Act 852
The Control of Smoking Products for Public Health Act 2024 came into force in late 2024. It brought vape products into a licensing and registration framework: registration with the Ministry of Health, SIRIM certification, labelling and packaging rules, local manufacturing standards, and excise duty.
What is being debated now
The Ministry of Health has said it intends to move against open-system vapes first, and there is a live proposal to remove the 15 ml liquid category — a move the local industry says would cost hundreds of millions of ringgit in tax revenue and thousands of jobs. Neither is final, and both would reshape the market if implemented.
The gap that matters
Registration and taxation are in place; enforcement is not. Online sales by unregistered sellers remain widespread, and products with undeclared substances are an acknowledged problem. That gap is why the “ban it and it goes away” argument keeps failing across this region.