Participating Countries
Participants selected their entries via several different methods:
- Internal Selection: The broadcaster selected the act and the song.
- National Final: The broadcaster will hold a one-off competition to determine their act and song.
- Festival: The broadcaster holds a slightly longer competition, usually with one or two semi-finals and a grand final. Sometimes the competition will take place over the course of a week (Italy’s Sanremo or Albania’s Festivali i Këngës) or over a couple of weekends (Portugal’s Festival da Cancão or Iceland’s Söngvakeppnin).
- Selection Series: The broadcaster holds a long-form competition to determine their artist and song, usually with multiple rounds of winnowing down options. Hungary (A Dal), Lithuania (Marathon), and Sweden (Melodifestivalen) are prime examples.
- Hybrid: A broadcaster may use one method to determine their artist and another method to select their song.
- Finland’s broadcaster selected Saara Aalto as their artist, but used the national final UMK to have the public choose her song.
- Israel’s broadcaster used HaKokhav HaBa (Rising Star) to select Netta, but her song was chosen internally.
Eurovision Song Contest 2018 First Semi-Final Participants
Running Order | Country | Artist | Song | Jury | Televote | Total | Rank |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Azerbaijan | Aisel | X My Heart | 47 | 47 | 94 | 11 |
2 | Iceland | Ari Ólafsson | Our Choice | 15 | 0 | 15 | 19 |
3 | Albania | Eugent Bushpepa | Mall | 114 | 48 | 162 | 8 |
4 | Belgium | SENNEK | A Matter of Time | 71 | 20 | 91 | 12 |
5 | Czech Republic | Mikolas Josef | Lie to Me | 98 | 134 | 232 | 3 |
6 | Lithuania | Ieva Zasimauskaitė | When We’re Old | 57 | 62 | 119 | 9 |
7 | Israel | Netta Barzilai | Toy | 167 | 116 | 283 | 1 |
8 | Belarus | Alekseev | Forever | 20 | 45 | 65 | 16 |
9 | Estonia | Elina Netšajeva | La Forza | 81 | 120 | 201 | 5 |
10 | Bulgaria | Equinox | Bones | 107 | 70 | 177 | 7 |
11 | FYR Macedonia | Eye Cue | Lost and Found | 18 | 6 | 24 | 18 |
12 | Croatia | Franka | Crazy | 46 | 17 | 63 | 17 |
13 | Austria | Cesár Sampson | Nobody But You | 115 | 116 | 231 | 4 |
14 | Greece | Yianna Terzi | Oneiro Mou | 28 | 53 | 81 | 14 |
15 | Finland | Saara Aalto | Monsters | 35 | 73 | 108 | 10 |
16 | Armenia | Sevak Khanagyan | Qami | 38 | 41 | 79 | 15 |
17 | Switzerland | ZiBBZ | Stones | 59 | 27 | 86 | 13 |
18 | Ireland | Ryan O’Shaughnessy | Together | 71 | 108 | 179 | 6 |
19 | Cyprus | Eleni Foureira | Fuego | 89 | 173 | 262 | 2 |
Portugal, Spain, and United Kingdom voted in this semi-final.
Eurovision Song Contest 2018 Second Semi-Final Participants
Running Order | Country | Artist | Song | Jury | Televote | Total | Rank |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Norway | Alexander Rybak | That’s How You Write a Song | 133 | 133 | 266 | 1 |
2 | Romania | The Humans | Goodbye | 67 | 40 | 107 | 11 |
3 | Serbia | Sanja Ilić and Balkanika | Nova deca | 45 | 72 | 117 | 9 |
4 | San Marino | Jessika (f/ Jenifer Brening) | Who We Are | 14 | 14 | 28 | 17 |
5 | Denmark | Rasmussen | Higher Ground | 40 | 164 | 204 | 5 |
6 | Russia | Yuliya Samoylova | I Won’t Break | 14 | 51 | 65 | 15 |
7 | Moldova | DoReDos | My Lucky Day | 82 | 153 | 235 | 3 |
8 | Netherlands | Waylon | Outlaw in ‘Em | 127 | 47 | 174 | 7 |
9 | Australia | Jessica Mauboy | We Got Love | 130 | 82 | 212 | 4 |
10 | Georgia | Ethno-Jazz Band Iriao | For You | 11 | 13 | 24 | 18 |
11 | Poland | Gromee feat. Lukas Meijer | Light Me Up | 21 | 60 | 81 | 14 |
12 | Malta | Christabelle | Taboo | 93 | 8 | 101 | 13 |
13 | Hungary | AWS | Viszlát nyár | 23 | 88 | 111 | 10 |
14 | Latvia | Laura Rizzotto | Funny Girl | 92 | 14 | 106 | 12 |
15 | Sweden | Benjamin Ingrosso | Dance You Off | 171 | 83 | 254 | 2 |
16 | Montenegro | Vanja Radovanović | Inje | 23 | 17 | 40 | 16 |
17 | Slovenia | Lea Sirk | Hvala, ne! | 67 | 65 | 132 | 8 |
18 | Ukraine | Mélovin | Under the Ladder | 65 | 114 | 179 | 6 |
France, Germany, and Italy voted in this semi-final.
Eurovision Song Contest 2018 Grand Final Participants
Running Order | Country | Song | Artist | Jury | Televote | Total | Rank |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Ukraine | Under the Ladder | Mélovin | 11 | 119 | 130 | 17 |
2 | Spain | Tu canción | Alfred and Amaia | 43 | 18 | 61 | 23 |
3 | Slovenia | Hvala, ne! | Lea Sirk | 41 | 23 | 64 | 22 |
4 | Lithuania | When We’re Old | Ieva Zasimauskaitė | 90 | 91 | 181 | 12 |
5 | Austria | Nobody But You | Cesár Sampson | 271 | 71 | 342 | 3 |
6 | Estonia | La Forza | Elina Netšajeva | 143 | 102 | 245 | 8 |
7 | Norway | That’s How You Write a Song | Alexander Rybak | 60 | 84 | 144 | 15 |
8 | Portugal | O Jardim | Cláudia Pascoal | 21 | 18 | 39 | 26 |
9 | United Kingdom | Storm | SuRie | 23 | 25 | 48 | 24 |
10 | Serbia | Nova Deca | Sanja Ilić & Balkanika | 38 | 75 | 113 | 19 |
11 | Germany | You Let Me Walk Alone | Michael Schulte | 204 | 136 | 340 | 4 |
12 | Albania | Mall | Eugent Bushpepa | 126 | 58 | 184 | 11 |
13 | France | Mercy | Madame Monsieur | 114 | 59 | 173 | 13 |
14 | Czech Republic | Lie to Me | Mikolas Josef | 66 | 215 | 281 | 6 |
15 | Denmark | Higher Ground | Rasmussen | 38 | 188 | 226 | 9 |
16 | Australia | We Got Love | Jessica Mauboy | 90 | 9 | 99 | 20 |
17 | Finland | Monsters | Saara Aalto | 23 | 23 | 46 | 25 |
18 | Bulgaria | Bones | Equinox | 100 | 66 | 166 | 14 |
19 | Moldova | My Lucky Day | DoReDoS | 94 | 115 | 209 | 10 |
20 | Sweden | Dance You Off | Benjamin Ingrosso | 253 | 21 | 274 | 7 |
21 | Hungary | Viszlát Nyár | AWS | 28 | 65 | 93 | 21 |
22 | Israel | Toy | Netta | 212 | 317 | 529 | 1 |
23 | Netherlands | Outlaw in ‘Em | Waylon | 89 | 32 | 121 | 18 |
24 | Ireland | Together | Ryan O’Shaughnessy | 74 | 62 | 136 | 16 |
25 | Cyprus | Fuego | Eleni Foureira | 183 | 253 | 436 | 2 |
26 | Italy | Non mi avete fatto niente | Ermal Meta and Fabrizio Moro | 59 | 249 | 308 | 5 |
France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and United Kingdom—also known as the “Big Five”—automatically qualified for the Final. Portugal, winner of the 2017 Eurovision Song Contest and host of the 2018 Contest, also automatically qualified.
#2: What is “Europe”?
We discuss what "Europe" is, get acquainted with this year's hostesses, and get caught up with some of the selection processes.
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#2a: The EuroWhat? Mini Week of January 22, 2018
A mini-episode with updates about what's happening in Eurovision selection season: Armenia to France, Belarus to Serbia, and places in between.
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#3: Messy, Messy
We have songs to talk about! France, Czech Republic, and Spain have selected and boy do we have opinions.
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#3a Mini: You ‘kay?
Ben and Mike dive into the United Kingdom's Eurovision selection process. Why has the country has struggled for so long at the Contest? Oh.
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#4: The Who? and the What? Now!
Lindsey Weber from the Who Weekly podcast stops by to chat about how the Olympics are the perfect world event to prep for Eurovision before getting into the songs...
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#1: Welcome to 2018
In our opening episode of The EuroWhat? podcast, our Eurovision specialists introduce themselves and share their first impressions of Albania's entry.
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