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Literature on the “transnational family” or the “split household” often assumes that family members’ spatial mobility across a national border is different from their mobility within the nation-state. But how do these two forms of mobility really differ from each other? To answer this question, the author analyses ethnographic data drawn from three communities: a rural community in the Koulikoro region of Mali; Bamako, Mali’s capital and the primary destination of most rural Malians; and Brazzaville, capital of the Republic of Congo. This comparative perspective enables the author to identify several commonalities between households split by transnational migration (from Mali to Congo) and those split by internal migration (from a rural community to the capital city). It also enables him to highlight the differences between these two types of translocal family, especially with respect to the upbringing and mobility of children. This analysis shows the utility of a transnational perspective in the study of contemporary family dynamics.