A field survey of terrestrial earthworms was conducted in the states of Penang, Kedah, and Perak, in Peninsular Malaysia, and revealed two new species of terrestrial earthworm belonging to the genus Metaphire Sims & Easton, 1972, which are described herein. Metaphire sedimensis new species, belongs to the octothecal group, characterised by having small circular of genital markings on post-setal of VI, VII, VIII, XVII, and XVIII. Metaphire hijaunensis new species, has three pairs of spermathecae at VII–IX, typical of the sexthecal houlleti species group but differs from these other members by its body size, position of the intestine origin and the number and shape of genital marking glands. Evolutionary divergence between the new species and their most closely related species revealed a high interspecific genetic distance of 16.4–22.9%, while the pairwise distance between M. sedimensis new species, and M. hijauensis new species was 21.3%. The detailed descriptions and illustrations of the two new species are supplemented with their DNA barcodes in order to facilitate future species identifications.

A field survey of terrestrial earthworms was conducted in the states of Penang, Kedah, and Perak, in Peninsular Malaysia, and revealed two new species of terrestrial earthworm belonging to the genus Metaphire Sims & Easton, 1972,which are described herein. Metaphire sedimensis new species, belongs to the octothecal group, characterised by having small circular of genital markings on post-setal of VI, VII, VIII, XVII, and XVIII. Metaphire hijaunensis new species, has three pairs of spermathecae at VII–IX, typical of the sexthecal houlleti species group but differs from these other members by its body size, position of the intestine origin and the number and shape of genital marking glands. Evolutionary divergence between the new species and their most closely related species revealed a high interspecific genetic distance of 16.4–22.9%, while the pairwise distance between M. sedimensis new species, and M. hijauensis new species was 21.3%. The detailed descriptions and illustrations of the two newspecies are supplemented with their DNA barcodes in order to facilitate future species identifications.