Studies on genre analysis have become a current issue in research study. One of the studies in genre analysis that has attracted many researchers is research article abstract. The aim of this article is to analyse the linguistic features used by Malaysian authors in their research article abstracts. 20 abstracts were analysed using the framework developed by Weissburg and Buker (1990). The linguistics features analysed are tenses, hedges and transition words. Findings reveal that not all Malaysian authors adhered to the Weissberg and Buker’s framework in writing the research article abstracts. The findings are later discussed and the implications of the study are presented.