Anyone brave enough to enter a song into Sweden’s highly competitive selection for Eurovision 2024 will face a new format this year.
A new change to the rules will see a total of 30 entries participate in Melodifestivalen 2024. This will allow an extra two more songs to compete in the Swedish selection than this year, but it comes at a cost.
The fifth Heat, formerly known as the ‘Last Chance’ round where the songs that placed 3rd and 4th in Heats 1-4 fought to get a spot in the Final, has been eliminated and replaced by a fifth heat comprised of new songs, just like Heats 1-4.
This means that each Heat will see a reduction in participants, down to six per show. Heats had been made up of seven songs since 2015, and eight songs prior to that. This makes a total of 30 across the five Heats for 2024. The top two from each Heat will qualify directly to the Final.
The Final, however, will continue to have space for 12 acts. This means the 3rd and 4th place finishers from the five Heats will still have a chance, albeit a slim one, to make it to the Final.
At the end of the fifth Heat, viewers will be shown a Snabbrepris or quick recap of those ten songs, and using the app, viewers in Sweden can vote using their ‘hearts’ one final time to save two of the songs.
These new hearts will be added to the hearts each act received during its Heat, meaning viewers really need to watch each show and vote to save their favourites from elimination.
Once in the Final, things will look normal to previous years with 12 acts participating and the vote being split 50% from the international juries and 50% from the Swedish public.
These changes are being justified as a way to keep viewers entertained as much as possible through every show, according to Melodifestivalen’s project manager Anders Wistbacka:
“We always want to make Melodifestivalen even better and more exciting for our audience. With this completely new arrangement, we believe we can maintain viewers’ engagement throughout the season. It’s no secret that we’ve lost audiences in the semi-finals. Now we hope to keep the excitement up through all the programs.”
SVT will open its submissions window at 09:00 CET on 25th August and accept audio files of songs until 11:59 CET on 15th September.
Do you like the changes coming to Melodifestivalen 2024? You can let us know in the comments below or on our social media @escbubble!
