In the online survey “The Most Beautiful City in Serbia?” (November 2014), participants gave the most votes to Novi Sad—35.47% (116 votes). Belgrade ranked second with 21.10% (69), while behind them a “second league” of cities emerges: Subotica (5.50%, 18), Niš and Valjevo (4.89% each, 16 each), followed by Sombor (3.67%, 12) and Zrenjanin (2.75%, 9). Other cities are scattered in smaller shares, with no clear challenger for the top.
Interestingly, the sample structure partly explains this ranking: among respondents, the largest share currently live in Belgrade (21.91%) and Novi Sad (14.51%), while as many as 21.30% report “something else,” suggesting broader but uneven territorial coverage. Over the past three years, respondents most often travelled to Belgrade (14.86%) and Novi Sad (11.39%), and then to Niš, Subotica, Kragujevac, and other major centres—meaning that part of the audience made choices based on personal experience, not only on “image.”
Travel reasons further illuminate the context: tourism and entertainment dominate (37%), followed by visiting relatives (25.20%), work (20.20%), and education (11.60%). The average age is around 34 (median 31), with slightly more women (53.89%).
Methodological note: the survey was conducted online on a self-selected sample of internet users (324), so the results are not representative of Serbia’s overall population.