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Background Influencing physical activity (PA) level should be public health system priority and by identifying and understanding individual variables, together with social, cultural and environmental factors that are potentially connected to PA level, is basis for developing successful interventions. Aim of this research is to determine whether there are differences in exercise motives of University of Zagreb students with regard to leisure-time physical activity level. Methods Participants were 1304 University of Zagreb students (857 female, 447 male), average age 20, 72 years. Croatian version of IPAQ (Pedisic et al., 2011), which measures adult PA, and Croatian version of EMI-2 (Vlasic et al., 2002), which measure 14 exercise motives, were used. Participants were divided in high and low physical activity group based on achieving minimal physical activity level required to gain health benefits, which is 10 MET hours per week, or 30 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity for five days in a week. Findings Physically more active students were more motivated by revitalisation, social recognition, stress management, enjoyment, affiliation, competition, agility and challenge motives, while there were no differences in weight management, ill-health avoidance, appearance, positive health, strength/endurance and health pressures motives. Largest differences were found in enjoyment and competition motives, whith physically more active students more motivated by them. Discussion Understanding students motivation differences with regard to their leisure-time PA level is really important when it comes to planning and creating intervention programs …