Balkan Countries Map

This map draws 11 Balkan countries: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia and Slovenia. No treaty or international body fixes the list, so sources count by geography, by history or by politics and reach different totals. The cases people ask about most are Romania, which lies largely north of the peninsula's usual edge, and Kosovo, whose status is contested. The next answers take both in turn, along with Yugoslavia, the Western Balkans and the difference from Southeast Europe.

Romania is a Balkan country on broad definitions, and this map includes it. Most of Romania lies north of the Danube, Sava and Kupa line that narrow geographic definitions use as the northern edge of the Balkan Peninsula, so those definitions take in only Northern Dobruja. Romania has 19.0 million people (World Bank, 2025), more than any other country on this map, and Bucharest is its capital. Slovenia lies wholly north of that line, and Croatia and Serbia partly, yet the map keeps all three. Romania's 41 counties and Bucharest have their own Romania counties map.

Kosovo declared independence from Serbia on 17 February 2008, and Serbia does not recognize it. Kosovo's own institutions govern the territory, and Serbia claims it as its Autonomous Province of Kosovo and Metohija. The map draws Kosovo as a region of its own, along the de facto lines in Natural Earth's data, so you can color and label it like the others. Kosovo has no ISO 3166-1 country code, so the map identifies it by its name. It has 1.6 million people (World Bank, 2025) and is the smallest of the 11 members by area.

Seven of the 11 countries on this map come from Yugoslavia. Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Serbia and Montenegro were its republics, and Kosovo was a province of Serbia. Albania, Bulgaria, Greece and Romania were never part of it, though all four are drawn here as Balkan countries. Montenegro left a joint state with Serbia in 2006, and Kosovo declared independence in 2008, which makes it the most recent change to the set. The map shows today's borders, not those of Yugoslavia or of the First World War, so it draws no historical Balkan states.

Southeast Europe is the wider, more neutral name. Sources disagree on its list, and some add Moldova, Cyprus or Turkey. The Balkans on this map are the 11 countries listed above, a narrower set. The Balkan Peninsula is a geographic term, not a political one. Its usual northern line along the Danube, Sava and Kupa leaves out most of Romania, all of Slovenia and the north of Croatia and Serbia, while its southeastern end takes in East Thrace, the European part of Turkey. A country list built on the peninsula alone would therefore differ from this map's.

The Western Balkans is a European Union term for six partners: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia. All six are drawn on this map, so the Western Balkans are a subset of the 11 and not a synonym for the whole region. Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Romania and Slovenia are the other five, and the term is used in European Union enlargement policy. The Serbia districts map and the Albania counties map show two of the six at a finer level.

Greece and Bulgaria are in the Balkans, and the map draws both. Mainland Greece lies on the peninsula, and the whole country is drawn, Crete and the other islands of 10 km² or more in its source data included. The Greece regions map shows its regions, and Bulgaria has its own provinces map. Turkey is not a member, but its European part, East Thrace, lies on the peninsula. The map draws East Thrace within Turkey, which stays grey like the other neighbors.

The free Ultimaps editor opens this map with no account needed. To color the countries by hand, click each one. To color them by data, upload a table with one row per country and its value, and give Kosovo its own row. Add pins and labels, then share the finished map by link or embed it on a website. A free export is a standard PNG with a small Ultimaps credit. High-resolution PNG, SVG and PDF export are Pro features.