Conceptions ancestral temples in Chinese popular religion of Singapore and Malaysia indicates that, in cross-border temple network interactions, the concepts of “orthodox” and “authority” have been integrated into the local systems of popular religion. Ancestral temples of various deities, more than a significant interface for the standardization of “state and popular religions,” functions also as a “medium” between the two. In Southeast Asia, ancestral temple awareness was originally unclear, but after the 1980s, because of the demands from deity ancestral temples for renovation in their native villages in China or the Chinese government’s gradual emphasis on the intermediary mechanism of ancestral temples, some ancestral temples in Singapore and Malaysia began cross-border deity visits or cross-territory alliances. A comparison between the awareness of Chinese popular religion ancestral temples in Singapore and Malaysia can illustrate the commonality, dissimilarity, and distinctiveness in Chinese popular religious beliefs in the two localities. Through this transnational comparative study, we realize that for many temples in both countries ancestral temple awareness has dimmed. Nevertheless, some of the ancestral temples in Singapore and Malaysia, amidst concepts of “orthodox” and “authority,” have developed a popular religious pattern of operation in cross-border networks, thereby constructing a conception of ancestral temple awareness.