National selections for the Eurovision Song Contest

National selections refer to the processes in which the broadcasters of the countries participating in the annual Eurovision Song Contest select the artist and song that will represent them in the contest.

The two principal ways for broadcasters to select their entries are open selections (national finals) and closed selections (internal selections). Since the introduction of semi-finals in the 2004 – due to the extensive amount of participating countries – and the rule of the "Big Five" countries  France,  Germany,  Italy,  Spain and the  United Kingdom), a wide range of countries have often alternated between national finals and internal selections based on final placing at the contest.

## National finals

 File:Loreen Eurovision 2012 winner.jpg  National finals are the process in which the public of a country can choose the artist with their song, often combining public televoting with the vote of an expert jury.

Organised by the broadcaster, these national finals (consisting of one or more shows) can be televised or non-televised, however, most of the time they are televised as prime-time television shows. On several occasions, the artist is selected internally and the public of the country chooses a song for them through a national final. Alternatively, the broadcaster can select a song and make the public choose the artist that will perform the song through a national final.

Among the most well-known national finals is *Melodifestivalen* in  Sweden, which features six live shows (four heats, a "Second Chance" show and a final in Stockholm) in different cities across the country. In 2012, over an estimated four million people in Sweden watched the final, almost half of the Swedish population.

 File:ESC2018 - Finland 06.jpg  Another example of a long-running national final format is *Uuden Musiikin Kilpailu* (UMK) in Template:Esccnty; in 2018 and 2019, each participant wanting to represent Finland sent three songs to the Finnish public broadcaster Yle, which would select the entrant, and the public of the country would then choose one song among the three that the selected entrant had presented to the broadcaster previously, through a televised final. In 2020, this format was abandoned in favour of a return to the open format seen between 2012 and 2017.

Note that  Albania,  Denmark and  Estonia are the only countries that have always selected their entries via the national final. Template:Yugoslavia and Template:Serbia and Montenegro also selected all of its entries via the national final during their existence.

## Internal selections

 File:Duncan Laurence GFDress-048-20190517-EuroVisionary.jpg  Internal selections are the process in which the broadcaster of a country appoints a committee or expert panel to select both the artist and the song, without holding a public vote.

Even though the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) "strongly" encourages countries to hold their own national finals, several countries such as  Russia,  Azerbaijan and  Bulgaria are among those that have opted for internal selections for most of their entries in the contest. Choosing this method is also a common strategy for countries after having failed to qualify for the final on several occasions.

## Participants

List of countries in the Eurovision Song Contest Template:As of 52 countries have participated in the contest at least once, and a record 43 countries participated in 2008, 2011 and 2018.

Table key
 Template:Center | FormerTemplate:Sndcountries which previously participated but no longer exist

## External links

Template:Commons category-inline

Template:Eurovision Song Contest

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