photo: Rei Weiyun / Xinhua/High-speed train for Serbian section
What was once a promise to stitch the north of Serbia together at true high speed. Today at noon, the first commercial train left Beograd Centar for Subotica, marking regular 200 km/h passenger services along the completed corridor.
According to railmarket.com, the operational green light followed the issuance of use permits for the final Novi Sad–Subotica section on Infrastruktura železnice Srbije’s network, enabling the full Belgrade–Subotica route to open. As the outlet notes, the first stage between Belgrade and Novi Sad has been running since 2022, carrying about 12.5 million passengers, including 6.1 million on Stadler KISS EMUs introduced for high-speed runs. With the whole corridor now in service, trains are operating to a new timetable designed to cut end-to-end journey times in northern Serbia.
Cross-Border Ugrade: ETCS, New Trains, and a Time Goal
Framing the wider cross-border picture, railway-technology.com describes the Belgrade–Budapest modernisation as a 350-km, double-track, electrified upgrade to European standards that will ultimately reduce capital-to-capital journey time to 2h40, down from roughly eight hours. The site details staged delivery on the Serbian side—Belgrade–Stara Pazova opened in 2021, Belgrade–Novi Sad in 2022—and notes the project’s China-Serbia-Hungary financing and contracting structure, with ETCS Level 2 and modern interlocking at the core. For rolling stock, Serbia ordered new CRRC trains (250 seats, up to 200 km/h), adding accessibility and smart diagnostics.
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On the run-up to today’s launch, RailwayPro reported dynamic testing on the Novi Sad–Subotica–state border (Kelebija) stretch from late September 2024, conducted by DB Systemtechnik at speeds from 50 up to 200 km/h. The publication also catalogued the civil works behind the upgrade—track doubling, dozens of new structures and station modernisations—and cited investment of roughly USD 1.1 billion for the section, co-financed by China’s Exim Bank and Serbia’s state budget. Looking ahead to the full Budapest link, the corridor is estimated to be completed around 2025–26, with journey times falling and cross-border tourism and logistics expected to rise.
"With the construction of this railway, everything changes… Soon we will reach Subotica from Belgrade in one hour and ten minutes," Serbia’s President Aleksandar Vučić said during test rides.