Spatial visualisation of internal migration flows in Slovakia

Political, economic, and social transformations following the Velvet Revolution in 1989 catalysed significant shifts in internal migration patterns in Slovakia, reflecting broader trends of change observed across other post-socialist countries in East-Central Europe (Pregi and Novotný, 2025). The post-socialist transition gradually reversed the previous rural-to-urban migration trend, giving rise to suburban migration flows. Since the mid-1990s, suburban areas have experienced rapid population growth due to migration (cf. Pregi and Novotný, 2025). Dynamic changes were also observed in interregional migration. Population concentration intensified in the regions of cities and large towns (Novotný et al., 2023; Pregi and Novotný, 2019), with the most significant interregional migration flows directed toward the capital city region (Novotný et al., 2023). Findings on changes in the volume and structure of migration highlight the need to further examine the specific spatial patterns of migration. The aim of this study is to provide a concise cartographic visualisation of migration flows and to interpret the resulting intra- and interregional migration patterns in Slovakia since the mid-1990s. The analysis is based on anonymised microdata on migrations between municipalities of the Slovak Republic from 1996 to 2022, provided by the Statistical Office of the Slovak Republic (SOSR, 2023). For analytical purposes, this period is divided into three sub-periods: 1996–2007, 2008–2019, and 2020–2022, allowing the study to capture key developmental trends across different transformational and post-transformational phases, including the deep economic recession in the early post-socialist transition, rapid economic growth in the early 21st century, as well as the periods of the global economic crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic. For cartographic interpretation, the Line Density tool (ArcMap 10.6.1) was employed, effectively visualising extremely large and complex origin-destination datasets (2,111,185 migration flows and 183,080 connections), providing valuable insights into spatial interactions (Figure 1).OPEN IN VIEWER

In the spatial distribution of migration flows, both several regularities and differences can be identified across all periods. Intraregional flows dominated throughout the whole period, while in the latter periods the share of interregional migrations increased, revealing the growth of east–west migration with the Bratislava region as a dominant destination. Besides Bratislava, a strong position in the migration network is held by the second-city region (Košice), followed by other major towns. During 2020, when the strictest COVID-19 restrictions were in place in Slovakia, the number of migration flows and connections between municipalities declined sharply. In the following 2 years, migration activity recovered, with more than 100,000 flows and nearly 31,500 connections recorded in 2022. This period also confirmed the dominant position of the western regions within Slovakia’s internal migration system. Overall, the findings point to ongoing processes of population decentralisation and metropolisation in Slovakia.