Serbian splits English’s single word “like” into two everyday verbs. For something that appeals to you, use sviđati se: the person goes in the dative and the verb agrees with the thing liked — Sviđa mi se grad (I like the city). For a habit, taste or deeper affection, use voleti with a plain object — Volim kafu (I like coffee). Keep želeti for wanting.
Published 5 October 2026
English does a lot with one small word. “I like coffee”, “I like you”, “I like this song”, “I’d like a coffee” — same verb, four different jobs. Serbian spreads that work over three verbs, and the moment you pick the right one your sentences stop sounding translated. The tricky one, sviđati se, is built back-to-front from an English point of view: the thing you like is the subject, and you are tucked into a side case. Get that shape once and the rest falls into place.
Here is the whole decision in one table. The rest of the article just shows you how each row works.
| Verb | What it means | How it’s built | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| sviđati se | to like (it appeals to me) | person in the dative; verb agrees with the thing | Sviđa mi se grad. — I like the city. |
| voleti | to like / to love (a settled feeling) | ordinary verb; object in the accusative | Volim kafu. — I like coffee. |
| želeti | to want / would like | ordinary verb; object in the accusative | Želim kafu. — I want a coffee. |
Two quick terms, since they do the heavy lifting below. The dative is the case Serbian uses for the person something is given to or happens to — roughly English “to me, to you”. The accusative is the direct-object case, the thing a verb acts on. If those are still new, our walk-throughs of the dative case and the accusative case go slowly; you don’t need them mastered to follow along.
Start with the one that feels strange, because it is the one you’ll say most. Sviđati se does not work like “to like”. It works like the older English “to please” or “to appeal to”: the thing is the subject, and the person is the one it pleases. So Sviđa mi se grad is literally “the city pleases to-me”, and we translate it as “I like the city”.
That has one big consequence: the verb agrees with the thing you like, not with you. One thing takes sviđa; more than one thing takes sviđaju.
The se is the reflexive particle that rides along with this verb — you never drop it. (It’s the same little se we cover in reflexive verbs.) The mi is the short dative form of ja (“to me”). Swap it to change who is doing the liking:
| Who likes it | Short dative | Example |
|---|---|---|
| ja (I) | mi | Sviđa mi se. — I like it. |
| ti (you, sg.) | ti | Sviđa ti se? — Do you like it? |
| on / ono (he / it) | mu | Sviđa mu se. — He likes it. |
| ona (she) | joj | Sviđa joj se. — She likes it. |
| mi (we) | nam | Sviđa nam se. — We like it. |
| vi (you, pl./formal) | vam | Sviđa vam se? — Do you like it? |
| oni / one (they) | im | Sviđa im se. — They like it. |
These short pronouns are clitics — little unstressed words that lean on the word in front of them and can’t open a sentence on their own. That’s why they sit in second position: Sviđa mi se… If you want to put the person first for emphasis, use the full form instead: Meni se sviđa, a njoj se ne sviđa. — “I like it, but she doesn’t.”
And because the person you like is just another “thing” in the subject slot, you can like a person, too — including the one you’re talking to:
To make it negative, just put ne in front: Ne sviđa mi se. — “I don’t like it.” And for a first impression that landed the moment it happened, Serbian often reaches for the one-off past form svideo / svidela / svidelo se (the completed, “took a liking” version): Grad mi se odmah svideo. — “I liked the city right away.” The ending still matches the thing: grad is masculine, so svideo.
After that, voleti is a relief: it behaves like a normal verb, and the thing you like is a plain object in the accusative. Volim covers a wide band of English, from a mild “I like” to a full “I love”.
For liking an activity rather than a thing, Serbian normally uses voleti + da + the present tense, where English uses “to …” or “…-ing”:
(You’ll also hear the bare infinitive — Volim čitati — which is perfectly correct and more common further west, in Croatia and Bosnia. In Serbia the da version is the everyday default.) The ekavian spelling used in most of Serbia is voleti; in the ijekavian areas — Montenegro, Bosnia and Croatia — it’s voljeti, with volim, voliš… identical in the present tense. Negate it the same blunt way: Ne volim. — “I don’t like it / I don’t.”
They overlap, and context usually sorts it out, but there’s a reliable lean. Sviđati se is about how something strikes you — an impression, an attraction, a reaction to something in front of you. Voleti is about a settled feeling — a taste you hold, a habit, or real love. Same noun, two angles:
The same split runs through talking about people. Sviđaš mi se is the early, lighter “I like you / I’m into you”; Volim te is the big one, “I love you”, saved for the people who’ve earned it. Mix those up and you’ll either sound cold or move far too fast — so this is one distinction worth feeling, not just memorising.
When “like” really means “want” — ordering, requesting, wishing — don’t use either verb above. Use želeti (to want), or soften it into a conditional, which is the natural polite register:
Avoid reaching for Hoću (“I want”) in a café or a shop — it’s grammatical but lands as curt, like barking “I want a coffee”. The conditional bih forms are what make a request sound like a request.
Watch the three verbs share the work in one short exchange over coffee:
— Kako ti se sviđa Beograd?
— Sviđa mi se! Baš volim ovu kafanu.
— I meni. A šta ćeš da popiješ?
— Volela bih jednu domaću kafu.
— Odlično. Sviđaju mi se ljudi ovde — svi su opušteni.
In English: “How do you like Belgrade?” — “I like it! I really love this café.” — “Me too. And what will you have?” — “I’d like a domaća (Turkish-style) coffee.” — “Great. I like the people here — everyone’s so relaxed.” Notice sviđa for one city, sviđaju for the plural ljudi (people), volim for a settled fondness, and volela bih to order — every tool from this page, in five lines.
Say each one in Serbian. Answers below.
Yes — the machinery is shared across all four varieties. Sviđati se takes the dative person and agrees with the thing liked everywhere; voleti/voljeti takes an accusative object everywhere. The visible differences are small and spelling-level: the ijekavian areas write voljeti rather than voleti, and lean on the bare infinitive (volim čitati) where Serbia prefers volim da čitam. The core choice — appeal versus settled feeling — is the same wherever you are.
You won’t drill this one into place — you’ll feel your way into it. In the app, the fox asks Kako ti se sviđa? and waits while you decide whether this is a sviđa mi se moment or a volim one, until the right verb comes out before you’ve thought about it. If you’re plotting the order that makes Serbian click, our honest guide to learning Serbian lays out the path. Start your free seven-day trial — no card →