1,206-CITY ATLASSOURCE-BACKED CITY REFERENCE
Malaysia
Compare this sourced profile of Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia before planning. Stable fields identify the place; confirm current transport, access and opening details with official sources.
01What the data says — and does not say
This page separates the checked GeoNames row for Kota Kinabalu—500,421, Asia/Kuching, and source coordinates—from live travel claims. Those fields identify and compare the record; they do not prove current transport, accessibility, census totals, or a City Atlas Club visit.
Wikidata's localized description: capital of Sabah, Malaysia.
02This city's dataset fingerprint
The source row behind Kota Kinabalu is GeoNames ID 1733432. Its recorded administrative path is Kota Kinabalu → Sabah → Malaysia, and GeoNames classifies the place as a first-order administrative seat. Kota Kinabalu occurs once as a primary city label in this atlas sample; the numeric ID remains the durable source key if names change. The city row itself was updated 2026-04-14; that date belongs to the source record, not to every transport or visitor detail in the real destination.
Within the fixed 1,206-record atlas, Kota Kinabalu ranks 1,143 by recorded population. Inside the 20 selected Malaysia entries it ranks 18; inside the 632 entries in its broad region it ranks 601. Its 500,421 population value is 0.87 times the 572,439 median for the country cohort and 0.50 times the 1,008,426 regional median. Kota Kinabalu sits in the lower half of this atlas's selected Malaysia entries. Kota Kinabalu's recorded value stays within one quarter of the country-cohort median used here. These comparisons describe this selected dataset only; they are not current census rankings or official urban-area boundaries.
Kota Kinabalu's three nearest other atlas coordinates are Zamboanga at 671.217 km with 1,018,849 recorded people; Samarinda at 728.856 km with 865,306 recorded people; Balikpapan at 809.689 km with 695,287 recorded people. The closest-to-farthest distance spread is 138.472 km. Compared with Zamboanga, Kota Kinabalu's recorded population is 0.49 times as large. Against Kota Kinabalu, Zamboanga follows Province of Zamboanga del Sur → Zamboanga Peninsula → Philippines in the source. Its point has higher latitude and higher longitude; it belongs to the selected Philippines cohort rather than Malaysia, uses Asia/Manila instead of Asia/Kuching, and carries second-order administrative seat rather than first-order administrative seat. Its recorded population is above Kota Kinabalu's. Against Kota Kinabalu, Samarinda follows Kota Samarinda → East Kalimantan → Indonesia in the source. Its point has lower latitude and higher longitude; it belongs to the selected Indonesia cohort rather than Malaysia, uses Asia/Makassar instead of Asia/Kuching, and carries the same first-order administrative seat class. Its recorded population is above Kota Kinabalu's. Against Kota Kinabalu, Balikpapan follows Kota Balikpapan → East Kalimantan → Indonesia in the source. Its point has lower latitude and higher longitude; it belongs to the selected Indonesia cohort rather than Malaysia, uses Asia/Makassar instead of Asia/Kuching, and carries second-order administrative seat rather than first-order administrative seat. Its recorded population is above Kota Kinabalu's. Its nearest-neighbor distance ranks 1,196 of 1,206 from shortest to longest in the same snapshot. Kota Kinabalu's nearest-coordinate gap belongs to the wider half of atlas distances. This pattern can reveal whether other catalog references are geographically close, but it cannot establish whether a border crossing is possible or practical, or whether rail, road, fare, or journey-time connections exist. Read as one record signature, GeoNames 1733432, the coordinate pair 5.9749 / 116.0724, country rank 18 of 20, and neighbor GeoNames 1679432 at 671.217 km bind Kota Kinabalu to a reproducible comparison. That combined key distinguishes the row; it is not a recommendation or evidence of a physical connection.
Kota Kinabalu's reference point is 5.9749° north and 116.0724° east. The IANA identifier Asia/Kuching is shared by 1 city rows in this catalog, while the GeoNames class PPLA is shared by 429 rows. Kota Kinabalu's row carries both second- and first-order administrative labels. Kota Kinabalu's point falls in the near-equatorial coordinate band used by this atlas's row checks. Kota Kinabalu's time-zone field defines the narrower catalog cohort; its place class is shared more broadly. GeoNames supplies no elevation for Kota Kinabalu, so the profile preserves that missing value instead of guessing terrain. Together these fields form a reproducible identity check for this page, not a claim about walkability, climate or accessibility.
03Nearby atlas references
Kota Kinabalu's closest other entries in this atlas are Zamboanga (671.217 km), Samarinda (728.856 km), Balikpapan (809.689 km).
04Verify before you book
Before visiting Kota Kinabalu, confirm changing decisions with current first-party sources:
Read how City Atlas Club verifies changing travel facts →05Sources and freshness
GeoNames updated the row 2026-04-14; the atlas checked the dataset 2026-08-04. Available Wikidata fields were verified in the same run.
GeoNames data: CC BY 4.0. Wikidata labels and descriptions: CC0 1.0.