Abstract: Exposure levels of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in air at urban roadsides or plazas in Nanning were determined by multi-bed adsorbent tube sampling followed by thermodesorption-gas chromatography-mass selective detector (TD-GC-MSD) technique. VOCs at Qingxiu Mountain in suburban Nanning were also analyzed in the same sampling period. The results reveal the relatively high levels of monocyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in Nanning. The average mass concentration of roadside levels of benzene and toluene were 47.5 and 159.2 μg/m~3, which were 2.9 and 2.0 times of those at Qingxiu Mountain, respectively. The ratios of benzene (B), toluene (T) and xylene (X) against ethyl benzene (E) showed that vehicle emission was the major source of VOCs in the roadside microenvironments. BTEX at the plazas had different ratios and variations compared to those in roadsides, indicating possible source contributions other than vehicle emission to VOCs at the plazas.