Silat is the collective term for a class of martial arts from the Nusantara and surrounding geocultural areas of Southeast Asia. It is traditionally practised in Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, southern Thailand, southern Philippines and southern Vietnam. There are hundreds of different styles (aliran) and schools (perguruan) which tend to focus either on strikes, joint manipulation, weaponry, or some combination thereof.

The word silat is used by Malay speakers throughout Southeast Asia, but it is officially called pencak silat in Indonesia. The term pencak silat has been adopted globally in reference to professional competitive silat for sport, similar to the Chinese word wushu. Regional dialect names include penca (West Java), dika or padik (Thailand), silek (the Minangkabau pronunciation of silat), main-po or maen po (in the lower speech of Sundanese), and gayong or gayung (used in parts of Malaysia and Sumatra).

Pencak silat is one of the sports included in the Southeast Asian Games and other region-wide competitions. Pencak silat first made its debut at the 1987 Southeast Asian Games and the 2018 Asian Games, both of which were held in Indonesia. Training halls are overseen by separate national organisations in each of the main countries the art is practised. These organisations are Ikatan Pencak Silat Indonesia (IPSI) in Indonesia, Persekutuan Silat Kebangsaan Malaysia (PESAKA) in Malaysia, Persekutuan Silat Brunei Darussalam (PERSIB) in Brunei, and Persekutuan Silat Singapura (PERSISI) in Singapore. Its practitioners are called pesilat.

Both pencak silat and silat were recognized as intangible cultural heritage by UNESCO in December 2019.

The origin of the word silat is uncertain. The Malay term silat is linked to Minangkabau Indonesia word silek, thus a Sumatran origin of the term is likely. It possibly related to silambam, the Tamil martial art which has been recorded as being practiced in Malaysia since at least the fifteenth century in Malacca. The preset forms of silambam are known as silatguvarisai. According to Malaysian source, the word 'silat' is said to originate from the Arabic word 'silah' (سِلَاح) meaning 'weapon' or 'silah' (صِلَةُ) meaning 'connection'. The most popular theory in Malaysia is that it derives from sepantas kilat meaning "as fast as lightning."

Other theories derive silat from the Sanskrit śīla meaning morality or principle, or the Southern Chinese saula (手拉) which means to push or perform with the hands. The Sanskrit theory is particularly popular in Thailand, as sila is an alternate form of the word silat in that country. Other similar-sounding words have been proposed, but are generally not considered by etymologists. One example is si elat which means someone who confuses, deceives or bluffs. A similar term, ilat, means an accident, misfortune or a calamity. Yet another similar-sounding word is silap meaning wrong or error. Some styles contain a set of techniques called Silap Langkah designed to lead the opponent into making a mistake. It’s not very easy

In its proper usage in the languages of its origin, silat is often a general term for any fighting style. This is still common in Indonesia where in some regions both silat and kuntao are traditionally interchangeable.

A number of stories exist detailing the history of particular styles, which are often used as origin myths for silat in general. One such tale is of a woman named Rama Sukana who witnessed a fight between a tiger and a large hawk. By using the animals' movements, she was able to fend off a group of drunken men that attacked her. She then taught the techniques to her husband, Rama Isruna, from whom they were formally passed down. There are several variations of this story depending on the region where it is told. On the island of Bawean, Rama Sukana is believed to have watched monkeys fighting each other while the Sundanese of West Java believe that she saw a monkey battle a tiger.