Do they speak English in Serbia? Is Serbia an English-speaking country, and can you live there without Serbian? (2026)

"Do they speak English in Serbia?" is one of the first questions anyone planning a move asks, and it usually gets one of two wrong answers: "everyone does" (from people who spent a weekend in Belgrade) or "nobody does" (from people who tried to transfer an electricity account). The truth is more useful than either. This guide, current to September 2026, gives the data on how much English Serbians actually speak, where it works and where it stops, whether you need Serbian for a residence permit or citizenship (you do not), how hard the language is for an English speaker, and how expats realistically bridge the gap. It is written by a team that lives in both languages every day; if you want the lessons rather than the theory, our Learn Serbian programme is built for exactly the situations described below.

Is Serbia an English-speaking country?

No. Under Article 10 of the Constitution, Serbian, written in the Cyrillic script, is in official use throughout the Republic; the Latin script is used alongside it in practice and appears everywhere from street signs to newspapers, and in municipalities where a national minority is numerous enough (Hungarian in much of Vojvodina, Bosnian in Sandžak, Albanian in the south) that minority's language is co-official locally. English is none of these things. The 2022 census recorded Serbian as the mother tongue of 5.6 million people, 84.4% of residents, followed by Hungarian (2.6%), Bosnian (2.2%), Romani (1.2%) and Albanian (1%). Serbia's statistical office does not count foreign-language knowledge in the census, so there is no official figure for how many Serbians speak English — and any percentage you see quoted online is a survey estimate, not a count.

What makes Serbia feel English-friendly is schooling and media. The first foreign language — almost always English — is a compulsory subject from the first grade of primary school (age six to seven), with a second foreign language (typically German, French or Russian) added in the fifth grade, so every Serbian educated since the early 2000s has had at least eight years of English. Foreign films and series are subtitled rather than dubbed, which is why a Novi Sad teenager's accent often sounds like a streaming service, and Belgrade's large IT and outsourcing sector largely works in English. The result is a country that is not English-speaking on paper and yet is easier for an anglophone than most of southern Europe.

How well do Serbians speak English? The data

The best available cross-country measure is the EF English Proficiency Index. In its 2025 edition (123 countries and territories, 2.2 million adult test-takers in 2024), Serbia scored 578 — "High proficiency", 25th in the world and comfortably above the global average of 488. The table puts that in context. Two honest caveats: EF's sample is self-selected online test-takers, who skew young, urban and motivated, so it overstates the population as a whole; and Serbia's neighbours score higher, so a move from Croatia or Hungary will feel like a small step down in English, not up.

The detail behind the headline explains most expats' experience. Serbia's reading score (587) and listening score (574) are far higher than its speaking score (499) — so the pharmacist understands your question perfectly and answers in three words. Proficiency is also regional: Belgrade scores 594 and Novi Sad 580, Vojvodina as a region 587, southern and eastern Serbia 554, and Šumadija and western Serbia 520 — the difference between "High" and "Moderate", and between a conversation and a mime in a town of 20,000. EF's age charts show the youngest adult cohorts scoring highest, which matches daily life: a 25-year-old barista and a 65-year-old building manager are, linguistically, in different countries.

Where English works in Serbia

In Belgrade and Novi Sad, everyday life runs in English without much friction. Cafés, restaurants, bars, shopping malls, hotels, gyms, coworking spaces, hairdressers in the centre, private clinics and dental practices, international schools, the larger estate agencies, mobile operators' flagship shops and the front desks of most banks all have someone who speaks it; taxi apps such as Yandex Go have an English interface; and the younger the person in front of you, the better it goes. The state's own Welcome to Serbia portal — where visa and temporary-residence applications are now filed electronically — is available in English, Russian and Chinese as well as Serbian. Niš, Kragujevac and Subotica are a step behind but workable in the centre. For a remote worker or a couple spending a year in a central Belgrade flat, English plus a translation app is a perfectly viable first year — as our digital nomad guide and the honest pros and cons of living in Serbia both note.

Where English stops: the parts of a relocation that run in Serbian

The moment you move from consuming to settling, the language switches. Under the Law on General Administrative Procedure (Article 4), administrative proceedings are conducted in Serbian and the Cyrillic script; Article 55 gives a party who does not understand Serbian the right to have the proceedings translated on request, but in practice the foreigners' department, the tax office and the municipal counters expect you to arrive with someone who can speak for you, and every decision, form and notice is issued in Serbian. Notaries — through whom every property sale, mortgage and many powers of attorney must pass — draw up their documents in Serbian, in Cyrillic (Article 18 of the Law on Public Notaries); if a party does not understand the language, the document must carry a signed clause confirming that its entire content was translated to them, which is why a court-certified interpreter (sudski tumač) attends the signing. Foreign documents — birth and marriage certificates, police clearances, diplomas, company extracts — are generally accepted only with a certified Serbian translation. Below the state, the same is true of the people you will actually depend on.

Do you need Serbian for a residence permit or citizenship?

No — and this surprises people coming from Western Europe. Serbia has no language test for temporary residence, for permanent residence, or for citizenship. The Law on Foreigners sets no language condition for a temporary residence permit or for the permanent residence you can apply for after three years; the Law on Citizenship's Article 14, which governs ordinary naturalisation, lists age, years of residence, release from your previous citizenship (with exceptions) and a written declaration of loyalty — no language exam, no integration course, no civics test. Compare Germany, the Netherlands or Austria, where a language certificate (typically A2–B1) is a condition of settlement or naturalisation. The catch is procedural rather than legal: the application, the interview, the decision and any request for additional documents all happen in Serbian, so "no language requirement" does not mean "no Serbian involved". Our guides to the residence permit, permanent residence and Serbian citizenship cover the conditions in detail.

Can you live in Serbia without learning Serbian?

For a while, and in the right place, yes. Whether that is good enough depends on what you are here to do. The table is our honest read after years of watching newcomers of every kind; the pattern is that English gets you through the first year, and Serbian is what turns a stay into a life — friendships outside the expat bubble, a doctor you can describe symptoms to, a landlord who calls you first, a plumber who comes back.

Do they speak English in Belgrade and Novi Sad?

Belgrade is the easiest city in Serbia for an English speaker: the highest EF city score in the country (594), the largest expat and international-business community, most of the international schools and private clinics, and a service sector used to foreigners in Dorćol, Vračar, Savamala and New Belgrade. Novi Sad is close behind (580) and, being a university city of around 300,000, feels proportionally younger; its student population, EXIT festival and growing tech sector mean English is unremarkable in the centre, less so in the surrounding Vojvodina villages where Hungarian may be the second language rather than English. Niš, Kragujevac and Subotica are workable; below about 50,000 inhabitants you should assume Serbian is needed for anything beyond a coffee, and in villages that the neighbour who speaks English is a resource, not a given. For how the two big cities compare on cost, see our cost of living guide; for how they compare on daily safety and getting around our safety guide.

How hard is Serbian for an English speaker?

Harder than French, easier than it looks. The US Foreign Service Institute puts Serbo-Croatian in Category III, roughly 1,100 class hours (44 weeks of full-time study) to professional working proficiency — the same tier as Russian, Polish and Greek. The difficulty is grammar: seven cases, three genders, verb aspect, and word endings that change with each. The good news is everything else. Serbian is written phonetically — one letter, one sound, in both Cyrillic and Latin — so you can read a menu or a street sign after a week; stress and pronunciation are forgiving; the vocabulary is shared with Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin, so one language opens four countries; and Serbians are patient, delighted and slightly astonished when a foreigner tries. "Survival Serbian" — greetings, numbers, prices, directions, the phrases you need at the market, the pharmacy, the MUP counter and with a landlord — is a matter of weeks, not years, and it changes how the country treats you.

What works, in our experience: lessons that start from the situations you actually face (utilities, the police, the doctor, the building meeting) rather than from textbook grammar; two short sessions a week rather than a monthly marathon; a tutor who is a native speaker and understands what it is like to be the foreigner; and starting before the move so that the white card, the flat viewing and the first bank visit are not your first Serbian sentences. Children need none of this advice — they absorb it in a school year.

Common mistakes English speakers make in Serbia

• Judging the country by its cafés. A weekend in Belgrade suggests everyone speaks English; the first utility transfer proves otherwise. Plan for the counter, not the café.
• Signing what you cannot read. The Serbian text of a lease, sale contract, handover form or bank agreement is the one that governs. Translate before, not after.
• Assuming "English-speaking agent" means "English-speaking process". The agent is one person in a chain of notaries, developers, banks and registries who are not.
• Letting a bilingual friend be your legal adviser. A neighbour can translate words; the risk is in the clauses they do not know matter.
• Ignoring letters in Serbian. Tax, municipal and court correspondence carries deadlines. Have every official envelope translated the day it arrives.
• Putting off lessons until "after we're settled". Settling is the part that needs the language. Start with Survival Serbian before or during the first month.

Written by the Relocation Serbia team. Last reviewed: September 2026. General information, not legal advice. Sources: Constitution of the Republic of Serbia, Article 10; Statistical Office of the Republic of Serbia, 2022 Census results on mother tongue (16 June 2023); EF English Proficiency Index, 2025 edition, global ranking and Serbia fact sheet (scores, skills, regions and cities); Law on General Administrative Procedure, Articles 4 and 55; Law on Public Notaries, Article 18; Law on Citizenship of the Republic of Serbia, Article 14; Law on Foreigners (temporary and permanent residence conditions); Welcome to Serbia portal (available languages and e-applications); US Department of State, Foreign Service Institute language categories; Serbian primary-school curriculum (first foreign language from grade 1, second from grade 5).