🇸🇪 Sweden: Participants Express Reservations Over Format Changes to Melodifestivalen 2026

Following the dress rehearsal for Heat One of Melodifestivalen 2026, some participants have expressed their reservations about changes to the ‘Final Qualifier’ announcement.

This evening has seen the first dress rehearsal for Heat One of Melodifestivalen 2026, ahead of the live show tomorrow evening. As part of the dress rehearsal, the new ‘Final Qualifier’ announcement was run through for the first time, with participants raising concerns over the new process.

SVT has opted to move the announcement of the ‘Final Qualifier’ away from the live broadcast on SVT 1, and instead, the announcement is now being made on the SVT Play aftershow immediately after the live show stops airing at 21:30 CET.

As outlined by ESC Insight, the new process sees the artists who placed 3rd to 6th return to the contest stage for a period of 10 minutes. During this time, they are interviewed by the hosts about how it would feel to qualify. Once the interviews are over, the ‘Final Qualifier’ is announced.

Some of the participants have expressed reservations about different elements of the changes to the show format. Jacqline has outlined to ESC Insight that she would like to see the format changes reversed, explaining:

“I feel like maybe not all of the people that are watching are going to transfer over to the app, so maybe they’re not going to see who qualifies.”

In addition, Indra has expressed her view that she would like to have the people in the Green Room surrounding her for the announcement, as that while “it was fun to go up on the stage again,” that “When you have a lot of people in the green room like I do, it would be comfortable to have those with you.” The new format has also been criticised within the Swedish press.

Comparisons have been made to the changes to the Qualifiers Announcement, which were trialled at the Eurovision Song Contest 2023. These changes saw all of the participants on stage, as five qualifiers were announced, followed by four qualifiers, followed by the remaining artists being split-screened, as the final qualifier was then announced, with the acts that failed to qualify leaving the stage. The European Broadcasting Union reversed the decision hours later.

Melodifestivalen 2026

Melodifestivalen 2026 will take place across six cities in Sweden and will be hosted by Gina Dirawi and Hampus Nessvold. The dates, places and host cities for the shows are:

Heat 1: January 31 – Saab Arena, Linköping
Heat 2: Feburary 7 – Scandinavium, Gothenburg
Heat 3: Feburary 14 – Kristianstad Arena, Kristianstad
Heat 4: February 21 – Malmö Arena, Malmö
Heat 5: February 28 – Gärdehov Arena, Sundsvall
Final: March 7 – Strawberry Arena, Stockholm

Several favourites from recent previous years are included in the lineup, including Medina and Smash into Pieces, who both reached top 3 twice each between 2022 and 2024.

Greczula, Vilhelm Buchaus, Meira Omar, Saga Ludvigsson, and Arwin are all straight back to the contest after making their debuts in 2025.

There are two previous Swedish representatives among the lineup. Robin Bengtsson, who represented Sweden in 2017 with “I Can’t Go On”, will compete in the second heat, while Sanna Nielsen, who represented Sweden in 2014 with “Undo”, will compete in the fifth heat.

Eurovision fans may be familiar too with AleXa in Heat 5. She was the winner of the inaugural and to date only edition of American Song Contest in 2022 with the song “Wonderland”, winning the contest for the state of Oklahoma.

Melodifestivalen has been held annually since 1959, except for 1964 and 1976, when Sweden did not compete in Eurovision. The winner of Melodifestivalen 2026 will represent the country in Vienna.

KAJ represented Sweden at the Eurovision Song Contest 2025 with “Bara Bada Bastu”. They finished 4th in the final with 321 points.

Source: ESC Insight