This study aims to evaluate the influences of commitment, trust, and service quality on students’ delight and direct effect of students’ delight on students’ loyalty in online distance learning (ODL) higher institutions in Malaysia. The Structural Equation Model (SEM) method was employed to evaluate the causal relationships among commitment, trust, service quality, students’ delight, and students’ loyalty. The model was developed based on the conceptual development and subsequently analysed using the Partial Least Square (PLS) technique on 241 pieces of data acquired from the online questionnaire survey. The results from the statistical data analysis clearly showed that commitment, trust, and service quality have positively influenced the students’ delight and the students’ delight has a positive and significant impact on the loyalty of Malaysian students in ODL higher institutions. The model of this study is the first model to be used by utilising Smart-PLS version 3 for data analysis to study student loyalty in ODL higher institutions in Malaysia. The results obtained can potentially assists ODL institutions better understand the aspects of student loyalty. The study also adds to the existing education literature and fosters strong implications in both academic and ODL institutions. Furthermore, the insights imply that ODL institutions should place greater emphasis on strengthening aspects of commitment, trust, service quality and students’ delight in building a sense of loyalty among Malaysian ODL students.