What plug does Malta use?
Malta uses the type G plug, the three rectangular pins familiar from the UK and Ireland. It is a direct legacy of British administration, which lasted until 1964. Every wall socket in hotels, apartments and rentals uses this format, without exception. The two-round-pin European plug does not fit, and there is no halfway trick that makes it work. British and Irish visitors can plug straight in. Everyone else needs an adapter, and it is the single most commonly forgotten item on a Malta packing list.
Voltage and frequency
230 volts, 50 hertz. That is the same standard as the UK, Ireland and the whole of continental Europe. In practice your devices will work with no risk at all once the adapter is in place: phone, laptop, hair dryer, shaver, camera charger. You do not need a voltage converter, only a shape adapter. This is where people waste money, buying an expensive transformer when a two-pound adapter does the job. Travellers from the United States or Canada should check that their devices accept 230 V, though nearly every modern charger does.
Which adapter to buy, and which to avoid
If you are coming from mainland Europe, buy a Europe to UK adapter, usually sold as type G. Two to five euros in any travel shop or supermarket before you leave. If you are travelling as a group or with a lot of devices, the smart move is one adapter plus a power strip from home: you take up one wall socket and charge five things. That beats buying an adapter each. What is not worth it: voltage converters, thirty-euro universal adapters, and any model without an earth pin if you are plugging in something that needs one.
You forgot your adapter, what now?
It is not a problem. Adapters are on sale at Malta airport the moment you land, in the shops in both the departure and arrival halls, and in the convenience stores and electronics shops of Sliema, St Julian's and Valletta. The price on the island is naturally higher than at home, often double, but still small. Plenty of hotels lend them at reception, and a growing number of places now fit USB sockets above the bedside table, which solves it for phones. For a laptop or a hair dryer, you still need the adapter.
The practical bit for a night out in Malta
A night in Paceville rarely ends before four in the morning, and a dead phone at three is the taxi you cannot order and the e-ticket you cannot show at the door. Two habits cover it: charge before you go out, and carry a power bank. The power bank itself charges from the adapter, so one adapter covers the whole group for the evening. It matters at the club entrance too: e-tickets are shown from the screen, and a dead phone in front of the door staff is an entry you have paid for and cannot use.