“Malibu” is about Miley getting back together with her fiancé Liam Hemsworth after their breakup in 2013. In a May 3, 2017 interview with Billboard, Miley spoke about the breakup:

I needed to change so much. And changing with someone else not changing like that is too hard. Suddenly you’re like, ‘I don’t recognize you anymore.’ We had to refall for each other."

Hemsworth has previously been the subject matter of Miley’s music; he was the inspiration behind her 2013 hit “Wrecking Ball.”