Buddhism in Singapore: Temples, Traditions & Numbers

By Tim Yu, Founder & Editor · Published 7 September 2026

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Buddhism is Singapore’s largest religion. In the 2020 Census of Population, 31.1% of residents aged 15 and over identified as Buddhist — 1,074,159 people, according to the Singapore Department of Statistics. All three major traditions are established here: Chinese Mahayana temples, long-settled Theravada communities, and a younger Tibetan Vajrayana presence.

How many Buddhists are there in Singapore?

The Census of Population 2020 states it plainly: “Among Singapore residents aged 15 years and over in 2020, 31.1 per cent identified themselves as Buddhists, 8.8 per cent as Taoists, 18.9 per cent as Christians, 15.6 per cent as Muslims and 5.0 per cent as Hindus.” Table 52 puts the absolute number of Buddhists at 1,074,159.

Two details matter: the census counts residents aged 15 years and over — adult self-identification — and its Taoism category “includes Chinese Traditional Beliefs,” one tick-box flattening much of the overlap between Buddhist, Daoist and folk practice.

Identification is uneven. Among Chinese residents, “Buddhists remained the largest group at 40.4 per cent in 2020 despite a decrease from 43.0 per cent in 2010.” Age matters too: Buddhists were 35.1 per cent of residents aged 55 and over, but 24.9 per cent of those aged 15–24.

Which Buddhist traditions are practised in Singapore?

Singapore holds all three major branches of Buddhism, each carried by a different migration: the National Heritage Board counts among the country’s major Buddhist groups “Theravada, Mahayana and Vajrayana.”

One caution before ranking them — the census counts Buddhists, not schools. Its ethnic table shows 1,052,114 of the 1,074,159 Buddhists are Chinese — so Chinese Mahayana is the most visible stream, its devotional life centred on Guanyin, the bodhisattva of compassion, on Pure Land recitation and on Chan practice (see Mahayana Buddhism).

Theravada came with Thai, Sri Lankan and Burmese communities. The board notes that Theravada Buddhists here may visit Sri Lankaramaya in St Michael’s Road and Wat Ananda Metyarama in Jalan Bukit Merah — the tradition set out in Theravada Buddhism and dominant in Thailand, Sri Lanka and Myanmar.

Tibetan Vajrayana arrived last. Sakya Tenphel Ling, “established in Pasir Ris in 1995,” is “one of the first Tibetan Buddhist temples in Southeast Asia”; it grew from the Singapore Buddha Sasana Society, formed in a classroom at Maha Bodhi School in 1965, and in 1978 gained Sakya Trizin Ngawang Kunga, the 41st head of the Sakya lineage, as its spiritual patron. The Amitabha Buddhist Centre, founded in 1989, is affiliated to the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition, which the board says follows the lineage of Lama Tsong Khapa. See Tibetan Buddhism.

They differ in real ways — a Theravada monastery and a Sakya temple keep different texts and liturgies — so resist any flat “Buddhism in Singapore holds X.”

Which are the major Buddhist temples in Singapore?

• Lian Shan Shuang Lin Monastery (Toa Payoh) — “Completed in 1909,” says the heritage board’s trail entry, it “is the oldest Buddhist monastery in Singapore,” “founded in 1898 by community leader Low Kim Pong and twelve Buddhist monks and nuns from Hui’an, China.” Its Hall of Celestial Kings and Mahavira Hall were gazetted collectively as a National Monument in 1980. The board’s national-monument entry for the same site says only “one of Singapore’s oldest Buddhist temples,” so “the oldest” is the trail’s claim, not settled fact.
• Kong Meng San Phor Kark See Monastery (Bright Hill Road) — established in 1921 by Venerable Zhuan Dao “in the Buddhist ‘forest tradition’, which places an emphasis on meditation rather than ceremonial or scholarly practices.” After leadership passed to Venerable Hoon Choon in 1947 it became Singapore’s largest religious complex: a 12-hectare site of prayer halls, monks’ quarters, a library, a retirement home, a crematorium and a columbarium.
• Buddha Tooth Relic Temple (South Bridge Road, Chinatown) — “built in 2007,” says the Singapore Tourism Board, and named for “what the Buddhists regard as the left canine tooth of Buddha,” kept in “a giant stupa made from 320 kilograms of gold.” It is “based on various elements of Tang Dynasty architecture” and holds two museums. (See what a stupa is.)
• Sakya Muni Buddha Gaya Temple (Race Course Road), the Temple of a Thousand Lights — begun in 1927 by the Thai monk Venerable Vutthisasara, who built the present temple in 1930 on a donation from the Tiger Balm brothers Aw Boon Haw and Aw Boon Par. It stands 15 metres tall, its 300-ton Buddha ringed by “a seemingly endless chain of lights.”
• Maha Sasanaramsi Burmese Buddhist Temple (Tai Gin Road) — established at Kinta Road in 1878 by a Burmese man named U Thar Hnin, and relocated here in 1988. Its 3.3-metre Buddha, carved from a 10-tonne marble block found near Mandalay in 1918, is “the largest known marble Buddha statue outside Myanmar.”

See also temple etiquette and Buddhist temples.

Who holds Singapore’s Buddhist community together?

The umbrella body is the Singapore Buddhist Federation, founded in 1949 “as the apex body of all Buddhist monasteries, institutions and all Buddhists,” says the heritage board; it has “actively promoted welfare, education, culture, racial and religious harmony.” Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong opened its present building in 2009. Small temples, the board notes, “may work with the Singapore Buddhist Federation (SBF) or with their larger counterparts to hold joint celebrations.”

What does Buddhist practice look like day to day?

Ordinary practice is domestic and undramatic: a home altar, a temple visit, offerings of flowers and light, chanting, support for the monastic Sangha (Pali saṅgha; Sanskrit saṃgha). The Buddhist–Daoist overlap the census hints at surfaces here too, in the Hungry Ghost Festival.

The tradition is candid that ritual is not the point. In the Mahāparinibbāna Sutta, as flowers and heavenly music fall on the dying Buddha, he tells Ānanda this is not real reverence:

Living by the Dharma (Sanskrit dharma; Pali dhamma), not only garlanding it, is a standard every school returns to.

How is Vesak Day marked in Singapore?

Vesak is a public holiday: the Ministry of Manpower’s 2026 list gives it as Sunday 31 May 2026. The heritage board describes the festival as marking “the birth, enlightenment, and passing of Gautama Buddha,” “usually celebrated on the first full-moon day of the Vaisakha month in the lunar calendar.”

It is kept differently and together. The board notes that Theravada devotees may visit Sri Lankaramaya and Wat Ananda Metyarama, and Mahayana devotees congregate at Kong Meng San Phor Kark See, known for its “Three Steps, One Bow” ritual, “an expression of repentance performed by Buddhists on the eve of Vesak Day.” The Buddha Tooth Relic Temple sets up “some 2,000 lanterns”; Mangala Vihara decorates the bodhi tree in its compound. Practices the board lists for the day include vegetarian meals, the lighting of oil lamps and “the performance of charitable deeds or volunteering.” The board calls the “inter-denominational approach to the festivities” a distinct Singaporean feature, with events “open to all Buddhist members, no matter what denomination they may belong to” — notable, given how the traditions differ. See also Buddhist festivals.

Is Buddhism in Singapore declining?

By share of population, yes. The Department of Statistics recorded Buddhists falling from 33.3% of residents aged 15 and over in 2010 to 31.1% in 2020; Taoists from 10.9% to 8.8%; those with no religious affiliation rose from 17.0% to 20.0%. In 2020, “24.2 per cent of residents aged 15-24 years reported having no religious affiliation, higher than the 15.2 per cent for residents aged 55 years and over.”

A census measures the label a person selects, not the depth of practice, and the institutions kept growing over the same decade — the Buddha Tooth Relic Temple opened in 2007, the federation’s building in 2009. Buddhism remains the largest religion by a wide margin, and the thinning is generational, part of the wider pattern in Buddhism around the world.

Singapore in the wider Buddhist world

Few places hold the Theravada of Sri Lanka, the Mahayana of China and the Vajrayana of Tibet at once — which makes this island a good place to see the whole family together, a late chapter in the history of Buddhism and how Buddhism spread.