Eurovision Song Festival 18

The Eurovision Song Festival 18 was the eighteenth edition of the Eurovision Song Festival. The contest was held in the Lisbon Arena in Lisbon, Portugal following the victory of Ana Moura with the song "Arraial triste" in the Eurovision Song Festival 17. It was the first time that Portugal hosted the Eurovision Song Festival. The contest was organised by the European Broadcasting Organisation (EBO) in cooperation with host broadcaster Rádio e Televisão de Portugal (RTP) and the contest consisted of two semi-finals on TBD and TBD July, and the final on TBD July. The live shows were hosted by TBD.
A total of 46 countries participated in the contest. Italy withdrew from the contest, while Kazakhstan returned after a break of one edition.
==Location==
The Eurovision Song Festival 18 was held in the Lisbon Arena, Portugal, following the country's victory at the 17th edition of the contest with the song "Arraial triste", performed by Ana Moura. It was the first time Portugal hosted the Eurovision Song Festival, as the country had not won the Eurovision Song Festival before.
===Selection of the host city===
Just after the victory of Ana Moura at the 17th edition of the contest, RTP launched a bidding competition for cities to apply if they wished to host the Eurovision Song Festival. Eventually, four cities submitted a successful bid to host the contest and the city presented three different venues. On the 13th of June 2024, it was announced that TBD would host the contest.
 Host venue
 Shortlisted
City 	Venue 	Capacity	Notes
Lisbon	Lisbon Arena † 	20,000 	
Lisbon	Campo Pequeno Bullring	10,000 	
Porto 	Super Bock Arena 	8,500 	
Braga 	Forum Braga 	12,000 	
===Semi-final allocation draw===
For the fourth time in the history of the Eurovision Song Festival, a semi-final allocation draw was used to divide the participating countries in multiple pots, in order to guarantee a fair voting process. Besides the fact that semi-finalists were now allocated in different pots, the members of the big 6 were divided between the two semi-finals as well, as from this edition on members of the big 6 vote along the semi-finalists. This measure was put into place to increase interest in the semi-finals from tv-viewers from the big 6 countries. Host country Portugal, Ukraine and Slovenia were allocated to vote in the first semi-final, while Czech Republic, Serbia and Albania were allocated to vote in the second semi-final.
Pot 1	Pot 2	Pot 3	Pot 4	Pot 5
 	 	 	 	
===Postcards===
The postcards form short introduction videos to each of the individual participants, while also showcasing beautiful spots of the host nation. Each postcard is approximately 30 seconds long. The postcards for the 18th edition of the Eurovision Song Festival were filmed between July and April, in order to show Portugese cities, cultural spots, and nature during all four seasons. The postcards featured mostly aerial shots of interesting tourist hotspots of the country. At every location, the artist danced a small routine of a Portugese folk dance of the particular area where the artist was shooting their postcard. The following locations were used for each participating country:
Country	Location
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
 	
===Opening and interval acts===
==Participating countries==
On 13 June 2024, the EBO announced that a total of 46 countries would take part in the contest. Kazakhstan returned, while Italy withdrew.
===Returning artists===
Artist	Country	Previous edition(s)
 	 	
===Semi-final 1===
The first semi-final took place on TBD July 2024 at 21:00 (CEST). A total of twenty countries participated in the first semi-final. Those countries plus host country Portugal, Ukraine and Slovenia voted in this semi-final. The highlighted countries qualified for the final.
Draw 	Country 	Artist 	Song 	Language	Place	Points
colspan="7"	 	 	 	 	 	
 	Finland 	 	 	 	 	
 	Germany 	 	 	 	 	
 	Kazakhstan 	 	 	 	 	
 	Latvia 	 	 	 	 	
 	Malta 	 	 	 	 	
 	Netherlands 	 	 	 	 	
 	North Macedonia 	 	 	 	 	
 	Poland 	 	 	 	 	
 	Sweden 	 	 	 	 	
 	Switzerland 	 	 	 	 	
colspan="7"	 	 	 	 	 	
 	Armenia 	 	 	Armenian	 	
 	Azerbaijan 	 	 	 	 	
 	Bosnia and Herzegovina	Elena Kitić	"2000s"	Serbian 	 	
 	Bulgaria 	 	 	 	 	
 	Croatia 	 	 	 	 	
 	Estonia 	 	 	 	 	
 	France 	 	 	 	 	
 	Ireland 	 	 	 	 	
 	Lebanon 	 	 	 	 	
 	Morocco 	 	 	 	 	
===Semi-final 2===
The second semi-final took place on TBD July 2024 at 21:00 (CEST). A total of twenty countries participated in the first semi-final. Those countries plus Czech Republic, Serbia and Albania voted in this semi-final. The highlighted countries qualified for the final.
Draw 	Country 	Artist 	Song 	Language	Place	Points
colspan="7"	 	 	 	 	 	
 	Cyprus 	Andromache 	"Me tin proti matia" 	Greek 	 	
 	Hungary 	 	 	 	 	
 	Iceland 	 	 	 	 	
 	Israel 	 	 	 	 	
 	Lithuania 	 	 	 	 	
 	Moldova 	 	 	 	 	
 	Monaco 	 	 	 	 	
 	Montenegro 	 	 	 	 	
 	San Marino 	Madalen Duke	"How villains are made"	English 	 	
 	Slovakia 	 	 	 	 	
colspan="7"	 	 	 	 	 	
 	Austria 	 	 	German 	 	
 	Belgium 	 	 	 	 	
 	Denmark 	 	 	 	 	
 	Georgia 	 	 	 	 	
 	Greece 	 	 	 	 	
 	Norway 	 	 	 	 	
 	Romania 	 	 	 	 	
 	Spain 	 	 	 	 	
 	Turkey 	 	 	 	 	
 	United Kingdom	 	 	 	 	
===Final===
The final took place on TBD July 2024 at 21:00 (CEST). Twenty-six countries participated in the final, with all forty-six participating countries eligible to vote.
Draw 	Country 	Artist	Song	Language	Place	Points
colspan="7"	 	 	 	 	 	
 	Ukraine 	 	 	 	 	
 	Slovenia 	 	 	 	 	
colspan="7"	 	 	 	 	 	
15 	Portugal 	 	 	 	 	
 	Albania 	 	 	 	 	
 	Czech Republic	 	 	 	 	
 	Serbia 	 	 	 	 	
==Other countries==
Eligibility for potential participating in the Eurovision Song Festival requires a national broadcaster with active EBO membership that would be able to broadcast the contest via the Eurovision network. The EBO issued an invitation to participate in the contest to all active members.
* - France Télévisions announced that France would seek ways to improve their performance at the contest, with a short creative break being amongst the possibilities. France Télévisions later announced that it would take part in this edition, but that a short creative break has not been removed from future possibilities.
* - Due to the bad result of last edition, the Irish broadcaster RTÉ started evaluating a possible withdrawal. The country did however show up on the final list of participating nations.
* - Due to Israel's brutal invasion of Gaza following the Hamas October 7 attacks, Israel's participation in the contest has been controversial. The EBO announced that it would closely monitor IPBC's behaviour in regard to the contest and announced that it would remove Israel from the list of participants if the broadcaster would break the EBO's set of rules.
* - Due to Italy's unremarkable performance in the contest, RAI hinted at a potential withdrawal. The broadcaster confirmed that Italy would take an 'indefinite break' from the contest to focus on other musical programmes, stating that the Eurovision Song Festival had no importance for the broadcaster any longer following editions of low public interest and bad results.
* - Directly after the end of the seventeenth edition, the Kazakh broadcaster announced that it would return to the contest.
* - During the voting ceremony of edition 17, the Lebanese spokesperson said that "Lebanon had a great time at the contest, but the time to say goodbye is coming closer." This resulted in a rumour of Lebanon withdrawing from the contest. After the show, LBCI announced that the spokesperson referred to the show nearing its end, not the Lebanese participation. However, LBCI confirmed that Lebanon was considering withdrawing from the contest due to Israel's participation in the contest following Israel's invasion of Gaza.
* - The Uzbek broadcaster MTRK announced that it was placed on the back-up list of participating countries if another country would drop out of the contest, furthermore stating that Lebanon was supposed to withdraw with a small national final being held between Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan to find a replacement country and act. The Uzbek broadcaster confirmed that this is still a possiblity for the future.