Exploring Visitor Reviews of Islamic Museums in ASEAN: A Netnography of TripAdvisor Content

This study addresses the limited empirical research on visitor experiences in Islamic art museums by applying a netnographic analysis of TripAdvisor reviews from three sites in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Brunei Darussalam. The primary objective is to examine how these museums contribute to halal tourism through visitors’ educational, cultural, and spiritual experiences, and to identify operational challenges that shape satisfaction and dissatisfaction. A total of 221 reviews were collected using a time-based sampling strategy, covering March 2017–June 2019 for the Indonesian Islamic Art Museum and the three months preceding data collection in early 2024 for the Jame’ Asr Hassanil Bolkiah Mosque and the Islamic Arts Museum Malaysia. The reviews were manually screened according to predefined inclusion criteria and analyzed using qualitative content analysis, resulting in 263 coded annotations categorized into positive and negative themes. The findings show that positive annotations (n = 194) primarily emphasise architectural beauty, rich and diverse collections, and the use of modern technologies, such as augmented reality. In contrast, negative annotations (n = 69) are associated with cleanliness issues, restrictive access, limited interpretive information, and ticket pricing. This study offers a focused, cross-site comparison that highlights how local museum contexts influence halal tourism experiences in these three countries. Theoretically, the research extends netnographic work on religious and cultural tourism by foregrounding Islamic art museums as underexplored halal tourism nodes, and, practically, it provides museum managers with concrete, visitor-derived insights to improve service quality, interpretive strategies, and technology integration.   Highlights• Employs a netnographic analysis of TripAdvisor reviews to examine visitor experiences at three Islamic art museums in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Brunei Darussalam.• Reveals that architectural beauty, rich and diverse collections, modern technologies (including augmented reality), and educational value are central drivers of positive visitor experiences in Islamic art museum tourism.• Identifies key operational challenges—such as cleanliness, restrictive access, limited interpretive information, and ticket pricing—that shape negative perceptions and highlight areas for managerial improvement.• Provides a cross-site comparative perspective showing how differing local institutional and cultural contexts influence halal tourism experiences and visitor satisfaction in the three museums.• Extends existing work on halal and cultural tourism by positioning Islamic art museums and a mosque-with-museum-like-functions as underexplored halal tourism nodes and offering visitor-derived recommendations for enhancing service quality and technology integration.