Living in Herceg Novi: the Ferry, Two Airports and the Trades You Can Book

"Living in Herceg Novi" is a live search, and Google completes it with "cost of living in herceg novi". Most of the other questions are about getting around: herceg novi to kotor, herceg novi to dubrovnik airport and transfer tivat to herceg novi, next to is herceg novi safe and is herceg novi expensive. Locals search for kucni majstor herceg novi (handyman in Herceg Novi), klima majstor herceg novi (AC technician) and majstor za ves masine herceg novi (washing-machine repair). We checked on 24 September 2026.

This guide answers what we can measure: who lives in Herceg Novi, how the bay and the ferry shape everyday trips, and which home services you can actually book. Rents, property prices, the cost of living and safety are outside it.

Who lives in Herceg Novi

Herceg Novi municipality had 30,824 residents at the 2023 census, the second-largest on the coast after Bar with 45,812. MONSTAT's census release on citizenship counts 5,354 foreign citizens, 17.37% of the population. That is more than twice the national share of 7.52%, close to Bar's 16.45% and well below Budva's 31.86%. The largest groups:

Two things stand out. Citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina are as numerous here as Serbian citizens, and more than a fifth of all Bosnian citizens counted in Montenegro (1,102 of 5,050) live in Herceg Novi; Trebinje is 40 km away by road. And the 2,033 Russian citizens are the third-largest Russian group on the coast, after Budva and Bar.

The bay, the ferry and two airports

Herceg Novi sits at the entrance to the Bay of Kotor, and every road east either goes round the bay or crosses it on the Kamenari–Lepetane ferry. According to the operator's timetable, the summer plan (4 May to 14 October 2026) has departures every 15 to 20 minutes, day and night, with 15 minutes from departure to arrival. Last winter's plan (15 October 2025 to 3 May 2026) ran every 20 minutes from 06:00 to midnight and hourly after that. On the operator's price list, a car costs €5 in the season (1 June to 30 September) and €4 outside it; residents of Herceg Novi and Tivat pay €3, and a monthly card for up to 50 crossings costs €100.

What the ferry saves, by road, on OpenStreetMap routing run on 24 September 2026. The routing engine allows only about 5 minutes for the crossing, so add the official 15 minutes and any queue:

Dubrovnik's airport is almost as close as Tivat's, but it is in Croatia, which has applied the Schengen rules at its land borders since 1 January 2023, under an EU Council decision. Whether it works for you depends on your passport and visa, and the border crossing adds time.

What you can book in Herceg Novi itself

On 24 September 2026 the platform had three verified professionals based in Herceg Novi, covering 12 categories:

• an air-conditioning installer working in Montenegrin, Serbian and English;
• a removals professional covering 200 km, for home, local and international moves and single items;
• a private chef and caterer working in Italian and English, with 30 years of declared experience and prices from €80.

What is missing is the everyday trades: no electrician, no plumber and no cleaner is based in town, and nobody repairs appliances. The local searches for kucni majstor herceg novi, elektricar herceg novi and majstor za ves masine herceg novi point at the same needs.

Who comes to Herceg Novi from elsewhere

We compared each professional's declared service radius with the road distance to Herceg Novi: nine professionals based elsewhere reach the town, three from Podgorica, two from Budva and one each from Tivat, Kotor, Bar and Berane. Together with the three in town, they cover 45 categories.

• Plumbing: four professionals, from Tivat, Bar and Podgorica (two).
• Electrics: one, from Podgorica, with a 115 km radius.
• Cleaning: a Budva cleaning service with a 70 km radius; a Budva property manager also offers turnover cleaning for holiday lets.
• Boats: a Kotor boat professional covers hull cleaning, antifouling and engine service.

Air-conditioning installation is the reverse case. Nobody from outside covers it, so the installer in Herceg Novi is the only one on the platform for the town. When someone travels in, ask whether the ferry and the travel time are included in the price.

What happened to Herceg Novi's requests

Three requests have come from Herceg Novi: boat electrics on 27 April 2026, and two air-conditioning jobs on 24 June 2026, one of them a repair, both written in English. None of the three received a quote before it expired. The town's AC installer was verified on 25 June, a day after the two AC requests arrived.

Herceg Novi, Kotor, Tivat or Budva?

For living rather than visiting, here is what we can measure across the bay, with Budva for scale:

Herceg Novi is the largest of the three bay towns and covers the most categories in town, but they are the less everyday ones: air conditioning, moving and catering. For plumbing and electrics it depends on neighbours, most of them across the ferry. Kotor in detail is in our guide to living in Kotor, Budva in living in Budva, and the whole country in our guide to the best cities to live in Montenegro.

Who Herceg Novi suits

• People who fly often. Two airports within 50 minutes, Tivat and Dubrovnik, if your passport allows the Croatian border.
• Anyone who needs air conditioning installed. The one installer on the platform for the town is based here; see the AC installation category and our guide to air conditioning in Montenegro.
• People planning a move. The removals professional covering 200 km is based in Herceg Novi; our guide to moving within Montenegro explains how local moves are priced.

Herceg Novi suits you less if you want an electrician or plumber based in town: they come across the ferry. For what to do when something breaks, see our guide to emergency home repairs on the coast.

What we did not measure

Rents, property prices, the cost of living and safety are outside this guide, and so are schools and healthcare. The platform numbers are small (three professionals and three requests in Herceg Novi) and describe one platform, not the town's whole economy.