Budva: Old Town, Beaches and Evenings

Budva is one of the loudest towns in the country and its holiday capital. Twenty thousand residents in winter and close to a hundred thousand people in August. The old town is the size of three football pitches; around it are beaches, and behind those the clubs that earned Budva the nickname of the Montenegrin Ibiza.

Come here for two things: a medieval centre at sunset and beaches ten minutes’ walk from it.

The old town

Fortified walls, narrow lanes, three churches on one square and a citadel on the very edge above the sea.

The citadel costs €5. Inside is a library of nautical charts, a model of the old town and walls you can walk. The point is the view: from up there you see St Nicholas island, the beaches and the whole riviera.

The old town was rebuilt after the earthquake of 15 April 1979, which destroyed nearly all of it. The reconstruction followed the original drawings and was done carefully: it does not read as a fake.

When to go. Before ten in the morning or after seven in the evening. During the day it is packed and the flagstones throw the heat back at you.

The beaches

Lounger prices below are for a set: two loungers and a parasol.

Mogren — two small beaches under a cliff, joined by a passage cut into the rock. Ten minutes on foot from the old town along a seaside path. Clear water, sandy beaches, loungers from €30–40 a set.

Slovenska — the main town beach, long and busy, with bars and water slides. Free entry, loungers €10–15, rising to €20 at the height of the season.

Jaz — two and a half kilometres out, wide and open, with a free section. This is where people go when the town feels tight, and where the big concerts happen. Loungers from €10, more often €15–20.

St Nicholas island (“Hawaii”) — a kilometre offshore. In season boats leave the promenade every half hour, about €5 return. Three beaches, pines and far fewer people.

The beaches south of town — Bečići, Kamenovo, Pržno, Petrovac — are covered in the Budva Riviera.

Where to leave the car

You cannot drive into the old town. Car parks run along the waterfront and by the bus station at €1–2 an hour, up to €3 near the Old Town, and in August they fill by nine. Parking is charged around the clock, and an unpaid ticket costs €50.

There is free space on the approaches from Bečići, though it is a twenty-minute walk. On zones and payment, see parking in Montenegro.

The evening

The promenade runs late: restaurants, bars, live music. The clubs are out of town along the Bečići road.

For a quieter evening, Pržno or Sveti Stefan are fifteen minutes’ drive away — the same restaurants without the crowd and with an island in the view. See Sveti Stefan.

Budva as a base

Most people stay here and travel out: half an hour to Kotor and the same to Tivat, an hour to Lake Skadar. In July and August allow half as long again, or even double.

If you plan to move around, a car settles the question: options and prices are on the car rental in Budva page, and what to read in the contract is in rental car pitfalls.

If you would rather not drive, nearly every coach excursion in the country leaves from Budva — north to the canyons, to Ostrog, to Lake Skadar. In season, group tours start from €39 per person. Routes and prices are under things to do; all of those tours, group and private, run only with a Russian-speaking guide.

And boats leave from the Budva marina. A skippered cruise along the coast takes in the islets of Katič and Sveta Nedelja and Kraljičina plaža beyond Čanj, the beach named after Queen Milena, which has no road to it. A boat costs from €170 an hour, or from €355 for three hours, and that is the price for the whole boat: see yacht charter. Boats run in season only; there are no trips in winter.

Loungers, citadel entry, boats and parking: prices checked in September 2026.