All you need to know about the Eurovision Song Contest 2026

There's not long to go until the Eurovision Song Contest, with this year marking the 70th time the event has taken place.

It will be held in Vienna, Austria following JJ's 2025 victory with their operatic ballad, Wasted Love.

The Grand Final will be held on Saturday 16 May.

Keep reading to find out what you can expect from this year's contest and what countries will and won't be taking part...

And, let us know in the comments if you have a favourite act or song this year!

The semi-final on Tuesday was held at Vienna's Wiener Stadhalle and 10 countries qualified for Saturday's grand finale.

Among them were Finnish duo Pete Parkonnen and Linda Lampenius, who are currently the favourite to win.

Viewers in the UK couldn't vote during Tuesday's semi-final, but will be able to vote during the second semi-final on Thursday 14 May.

The second semi-final will feature:

Across both semi-finals we will see 10 contestants eliminated from the competition, giving us 25 competitors for Saturday's Grand Final.

There are a group of countries that qualify automatically for the Grand Final:

These countries go straight to the final as they provide the most funding to the competition.

This year Austria automatically gets a place as the host country and last year's winner.

However, you will get the chance to see these countries perform during the semi-finals, with Italy and Germany performing on Tuesday, and France, Austria and the UK performing on Thursday.

But, of course, you won't need to vote for any of them!

This year five competition regulars will be not be taking part, with Iceland, Ireland, the Netherlands, Slovenia and Spain all boycotting the event.

That means they are choosing not to send an act to perform, and in some cases won't be showing the contest on TV at all.

The boycotts are because of Israel's participation in the competition and the Israeli government's actions during the war in Gaza.

They and other countries had called for a vote on whether Israel should be excluded from the competition over the war in Gaza, as well as claims of unfair voting.

When the vote on Israel didn't take place, the countries decided to withdraw from the competition.

Ireland's broadcaster RTÉ said it wouldn't participate given the "loss of lives in Gaza and the humanitarian crisis there".

Spanish broadcaster RTVE said that it was agreed "last September that Spain would withdraw from Eurovision if Israel was part of it."

Icelandic national broadcaster RÚV, said: "There is no peace or joy connected to this contest as things stand now. On that basis, first and foremost, we are stepping back while the situation is as it is."

Israel's President, Isaac Herzog, said Israel "deserves to be represented on every stage in the world, and I am fully and actively committed to that".

In response to the countries boycotting, Eurovision director Martin Green said: "We respect the decision of all broadcasters who have chosen not to participate in [the] Eurovision Song Contest and hope to welcome them back soon."

Russia also won't be there, having been banned from Eurovision since its invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Eurovision has been popular in Australia for more than 30 years and in 2014 they were invited to perform during the interval at the semi-finals.

In 2015 as the contest celebrated its 50th birthday, Australia was given a special one-off chance to compete and Eurovision bosses were so impressed that Australia has been allowed to return every year ever since.

Australia aren't the only non-European country competing either.

The contest is organised by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), made up of various broadcasters from countries across Europe and beyond.

There are 73 member stations from more than 56 countries, who can all send acts to Eurovision if they decide to.

No, perhaps surprisingly, they don't!

For example, this year San Marino will be represented by 80s singer Boy George who is from the UK, performing along with Italian singer Senhit.

This year is also the first time the UK's song, called Eins, Zwei, Drei, by Look Mum No Computer won't be sung entirely in English, with title spelling out, 'one, two, three' in German.

Are you excited for this year's Eurovison?

What are you looking forward to seeing and how do you think the UK's entry will do?

Let us know in the comments...