Maribor has been named the third best destination in Europe this year in a poll by European Best Destinations in which over half a million travellers were choosing between more than 400 destinations. The city was also named the best culinary destination in Europe.

Maribor is preceded only by Warsaw, named the best destination in Europe this year, and Athens in second place of the ranking facilitated by the organisation promoting European tourism sector.

More than 68,800 people voted for Maribor, which surpassed Vienna, London, Copenhagen and Prague. In the culinary destination ranking, Maribor placed ahead of Rome, Porto and Paris, the Maribor tourism office announced on 10 February.

A total of 686,000 votes were cast in the poll, with some 48% submitted in Europe, and the rest from around the world. 28% of votes for Maribor were cast from the UK, 13% from the US, 11% in Germany, 9% in Austria, 6% in France and 5.4% in Italy.

The local tourism office said an intensive media campaign will follow, including in outlets such as Forbes, Conde Nast Traveller, National Geographic, Corriere Viaggi, Yahoo and Geo.

Maribor Mayor Saša Arsenovič said the success was the result of development of the entire region and the cooperation of key partners. "We've proven once again that we can hold our own against big cities."

Maribor recorded 196,033 visitors and 439,414 nights spent by tourists last year, up 89% and 71% from 2021. In the last third of the year nights were 9% above the figure seen in the record year of 2019.

As many as 88% of the visitors came from abroad, most from Germany, Poland, Croatia, Serbia, Austria, Ukraine and Italy.

Last year, Ljubljana was named the best destination in Europe by European Best Destinations, with the local tourism office saying the ranking brought with it an exceptional promotional campaign worth over , with over 420 million people learning about the destination.