The Balkans have long figured prominently in the studies of human adaptations and dispersals. Situated at the crossroads of continents, the region acted as a significant corridor for population movements and, during cold phases, served as a primary glacial refugium. Despite this pivotal role, the regional Palaeolithic record remains paradoxically sparse: represented by only a handful of well-known sites, the evidence is otherwise fragmentary, poorly dated, excavated decades ago, and rarely integrated into broader regional syntheses. This talk presents several case studies from recent research on the Middle and Upper Palaeolithic that begin to address this gap, illustrating the Balkans' role in demographic, environmental, and cultural processes during the Palaeolithic.