In a ranking of 180 countries, Croatia moved up by seven spots from 2013 to reach 58th place in 2014. This is now Croatia's best performance since 2008.
The RSF compiles the ranking according to seven criteria: media pluralism, independence of media vis-a-vis political, economic, religious and military centres of power, self-censorship, the legislation governing the media, transparency, performance of the infrastructure supporting the media and the level of abuse of reporters.
On a scale from zero to 100, which signifies the worst performance, Croatia scored 26.12 points, and is in the group of countries branded as those with "noticeable problems" in media freedoms.
The ranking has been topped by Finland for five years in a row. Denmark, Norway, Sweden and the Netherlands follow.
European Union member states that fared worse than Croatia are Bulgaria, which ranks 106th, Greece, which ranks 91st, Italy, 73rd, and Hungary, 65th.
As for the countries in Croatia's neighbourhood, Slovenia ranks 35th, Bosnia and Herzegovina 66th, Serbia 67th, Montenegro 114th and Macedonia 117th.
The five countries at the bottom of the rankings are China, Syria, Turkmenistan, North Korea and Eritrea.
Media freedom suffered a "drastic decline" worldwide last year in part because of extremist groups such as Islamic State and Boko Haram, the watchdog group said in its latest annual evaluation.
The Islamic State group active in Syria and Iraq, Boko Haram in northern Nigeria and Cameroon, and criminal organisations in Italy and Latin America all used "fear and reprisals to silence journalists and bloggers who dare to investigate or refuse to act as their mouthpieces," said the RSF.
The Reporters Without Borders 2015 World Press Freedom Index stated that there was an eight percent increase in violations of freedom of information in 180 countries in 2014 compared to 2013, according to its statistically weighted calculation.