Eurovision 2025: Post-Show Analysis

It’s been a while since the Grand Final of Eurovision 2025, and I think it’s about time for me to have a little look back and reflect on everything that unfolded in Basel. Now I’ve had a bit of time to process it all, I have some thoughts to share on this year’s contest. In this post, I’ll be discussing the shows themselves, everything that went well and what I think could change for next year, and of course the all-important results. I won’t drag it out too much though, as I’m going to save my detailed results analysis for another series of articles that I’m hoping to publish over the summer.

Firstly, I would like to congratulate Switzerland for putting on three excellent shows in another tricky year. I don’t think the hosting will be remembered as one for the ages, like Stockholm 2016 or Liverpool 2023, but it was very well-executed and definitely felt warmer than the decidedly clinical shows we had from Malmö last year. Sandra and Hazel were excellent hosts, and bounced off each other very well. There were a couple of moments, particularly during the first semi-final, that felt a little bit strange (I believe something had gone wrong with the voting, exposing the lack of a solid contingency plan) but on the whole I think they will be remembered as one of the better elements of this Eurovision. The addition of Michelle for the final felt a bit unnecessary after we had spent the semi-finals getting to know the other two, but not the end of the world.

The interval acts were also enjoyable, particularly the “Made in Switzerland” song from the first semi-final – it’s always nice to see Petra Mede making a surprise appearance and I really appreciated the comic nature of it. The “doesn’t matter if you’re good or brutal” lyric was perhaps a bit misguided, and certainly raised a few eyebrows, but I think we got the point and I’ve certainly been enjoying listening to the song on Spotify since the contest. It was so lovely to see so many previous Eurovision contestants back on stage as well; the performance of “Ne partez pas sans moi” was particularly moving, but it was also great to see some of the 2020 artists finally get to perform their songs (although it would have been nice to have seen some of the artists who didn’t get to come back in 2021).

The "Made in Switzerland" interval act from the first semi-final (photo: Alma Bengtsson/EBU)

Obviously everybody (particularly Graham Norton) was on the edge of their seats waiting to see whether or not Céline would be making an appearance, which didn’t come to pass in the end, but the pre-recorded message was a nice gesture. It was good to see Käärijä and Baby Lasagna collaborating on a song that I must admit has rarely left my head since I first heard it, and Nemo delivered an excellent performance of their new song. I’ve heard many people saying that it was weird, or they didn’t understand it, but I rather think that was the point – after all, the song is called “Unexplainable”. Whilst it wasn’t for me, I can appreciate the quality of the composition and it clearly meant so much for Nemo to have that opportunity.

I must now congratulate our new Eurovision winner, JJ from Austria. By the end of the night, “Wasted Love” had gathered enough points from the juries and the televote to push it into the lead. In my opinion, this is a very deserving winner and JJ had such a positive attitude throughout the Eurovision process that it’s difficult to hold any sort of grievance now. I must admit that I wasn’t expecting Austria to take the victory heading in to the Grand Final – I wasn’t convinced by the staging and also wondered if the ‘popera’ could work two years in a row – but I’m very glad to have been proven wrong. In fact, I was proven wrong about quite a lot on the night of the final; sharing predictions is fun, but does leave you looking a bit silly if you get it as wrong as I did this year.

Austria's JJ was the winner of the Eurovision Song Contest 2025. (photo: Alma Bengtsson/EBU)

Whilst Austria’s win was deserved, it was by no means convincing: JJ’s winning score of 436 points is by some distance the lowest winning score since the current voting system was introduced in 2016. The only other winner to have scored fewer than 500 points is Duncan Laurence in 2019; and he came very close with 498. It’s also the third consecutive year in which the overall winner has been the jury winner whilst the televote has gone elsewhere. I still think this is mainly down to televote-only semi-finals, but we also can’t ignore the two huge televote magnets we have in the form of Ukraine and Israel.

That being said, Austria’s jury score was nowhere near the landslides achieved by Loreen and Nemo in 2023 and 2024 respectively; in fact, JJ’s 258 points is very low for a jury winner and there is only one jury winner since 2016 to have scored fewer points, that being North Macedonia’s Tamara Todevska, again in 2019. The jury votes this year were much more widely spread than we have seen over the last couple of years: thirteen different countries received maximum marks from at least one jury, and Austria only received 8 sets of 12 points; compared to 15 for Loreen and a whopping 22 for Nemo (out of a possible 36). If ever there was a year for the televote to play the deciding role in choosing the winner, surely this was it.

Austria’s closest competition turned out to be televote winner Israel, with Yuval Raphael’s “New Day Will Rise”. In the end, it wasn’t particularly close: Israel finished with 357 points, 79 behind JJ, with 297 of those coming from the public. A lot of questions have been raised in the aftermath of this year’s contest about the legitimacy of Israel’s televote score, and I do believe that there is a discussion to be had about the way in which the televote is conducted, but the fact of the matter is that none of the Israeli delegation’s actions this year (at least in terms of the vote) violated any of the Eurovision rules. Again, maybe this is a fault of the rules themselves, in which case should we be blaming the game rather than the player?

This is definitely something I will come back to in the future, because clearly Eurovision cannot continue like this – whilst I am not actively or inherently against Israel participating in the contest, I do believe that an Israeli victory would have been nothing short of a disaster, from a logistical perspective if nothing else. However, as is the general theme at the top of the scoreboard this year, Israel’s score is very low indeed considering the overall finishing position: last year, Eden Golan’s “Hurricane” scored more points yet could only manage a fifth-place finish. And if Israel did ‘rig’ the televote, as has been suggested, they didn’t do so particularly effectively, as their winning score is one of the lowest we’ve seen for quite some time.

I’m not naïve enough to believe that this song scored 297 points due to its compositional merits: I know that Israel have an advantage in the televote firstly due to those across Europe who do support them in everything that is currently going on in the Middle East, and also due to the huge amount of resources poured into international advertising, meaning that Israel likely received televotes from people who actually have little to no interest in Eurovision itself. This is what makes this year’s result feel different to the huge outpouring of support we have seen for Ukraine over the last few years, and particularly in 2022. Again, it’s not technically against the rules, but it’s also arguably not in the spirit of the contest, and I have been glad to see broadcasters raising concerns about this recently.

Yuval Raphael finished second in Eurovision 2025 for Israel. (photo: Alma Bengtsson/EBU)

Third place, only one point behind Israel, went to Estonia’s Tommy Cash. Those who have read my review of this entry published at the end of April will know that I was not initially a fan of this song; quite the opposite, in fact. However, the package did grow on me during Eurovision week; it felt like Tommy was finally showing some respect for Eurovision and putting in the effort required for such a big performance. I particularly enjoyed the ‘stage invasion’ which really added a touch of humanity to the whole thing. Estonia finished second in the televote (although some might argue that it was the legitimate winner), which with hindsight shouldn’t have come as a surprise: Tommy Cash is singing from the same hymn sheet as Käärijä, Joost and Baby Lasagna, all of whom had televote victories in one form or another over the last few years.

Clearly this was the package that connected with voters on the night; and I think it did particularly well to do so from third in the running order. What did surprise me was Estonia’s jury score. In my review of “Espresso macchiato”, I expressed my desire that the juries would ‘give it the result it deserves’ – and whilst my feelings aren’t quite so strong any more, I still think this got more than its fair share of jury votes. I don’t think it should have been fighting for scraps at the bottom, but this finishing in ninth place, with 98 points; ahead of the UK, Finland and Malta, seems ridiculous. Maybe jurors were a bit more conscious this year of televote-friendly entries being harmed by the jury in the past, and the only explanation I can think of is that they over-compensated. I also think it’s worth noting that Estonia would have finished second had it not been for the ‘Rest of the World’ televote, but that’s probably a discussion for another day.

Estonia's Tommy Cash finished third in the Eurovision Song Contest 2025. (photo: Sarah Louise Bennett/EBU)

Pre-contest favourites Sweden could only manage fourth place in the end with “Bara bada bastu”. Anyone who has read my previous entries on this blog will know that I was never convinced that Sweden would be our winner this year, and I stand by my sentiment that KAJ’s song only received as much attention as it did because it represented such a change of direction for the country in Eurovision. In the end, I think this fell down the gap of not being serious enough to be classed as a ‘serious song’, but being slightly too polished (maybe too Swedish) to be considered a ‘silly song’ in the same way as Estonia. I really don’t want to take anything away from KAJ’s amazing achievement, and I do hope Sweden continue to think outside the box when it comes to Eurovision; but I do think it’s important to consider why this didn’t live up to the expectations of fans.

Rounding out the top five was Lucio Corsi’s “Volevo essere un duro”, representing Italy. I was so pleased that this performance connected on the night, and think that the use of English subtitles was probably instrumental in helping audiences understand the deeply emotional meaning of the song. It was also nice to see the first live instrument at Eurovision in a number of years in the form of Lucio’s harmonica. This was another one the fandom seemed to get wrong, with many predicting that this would be Italy’s worst result in several years. Again, I like to think that I saw this one coming, comparing it to the trajectory of Marco Mengoni in 2023. Overall, I think this was a package hugely elevated by its staging, which really took it from Sanremo to Eurovision in exactly the right way.

Italy's Lucio Corsi performing at the Eurovision Song Contest 2025. (photo: Corrine Cumming/EBU)

Greece’s Klavdia surprised a lot of people by qualifying for the final, and surprised even more people by ending up sixth on the final scoreboard, with solid support from both the jury and televote. I sort of predicted this in my review, comparing it to Alika’s “Bridges”, but I must say that I really didn’t expect Greece to qualify as easily as they did, nor did I think they would be doing better with the televote than the jury in the final. Behind Klavdia was Louane from France, who ended up with a very similar result to Destiny from Malta in 2021; a strong jury result hampered by a fairly weak televote. Before the show, I had predicted that France would be our winner, so this did come as a bit of a surprise at the time, however, I don’t think “Maman” was staged as effectively as it could have been, and wonder if Louane’s vocals didn’t appeal to first-time listeners. The song also isn’t quite as classic ‘chanson’ as previous French entries from Barbara Pravi and Slimane, so perhaps didn’t unlock that voting group.

My personal favourite song this year, “Zjerm” by Shkodra Elektronike, ended up finishing eighth. I was so pleased with this result, but quite disappointed by how low they were ranked by the juries. Whilst I did foresee this song being more appealing to the televote, I thought it would get more respect than it did in the end, and I’m still not sure quite what it was that didn’t connect. In any case, this is still one of Albania’s best Eurovision results ever, and Shkodra Elektronike can be very proud of having produced such a fan favourite song. From there we move to one of my least favourite songs this year, in Ziferblat’s “Bird of Pray” for Ukraine. I think this position is probably the most egregious out of any on the final scoreboard, and genuinely believe that had this song been sent by Azerbaijan or Georgia (or indeed most other countries), it would have struggled to qualify.

The final song in the top ten is a special one. It’s “Voyage” by Zoë Më, which represented the host country of Switzerland. What’s particularly notable about this result is that of the 214 points Switzerland received, all of them came from the juries. “Voyage” was ranked second by the music industry professionals, only behind eventual winners Austria, however received the dreaded nul points from the televote. This was a huge disappointment, particularly as the song came close to receiving points from a number of countries, however, I think primarily this is another indicator of why the juries are so vital in the semi-finals: “Voyage” only got the result it did because it was an automatic qualifier, and what a travesty it would have been to have not had this song in the final.

Zoë Më of Switzerland scored nul points from the televote in Eurovision 2025. (photo: Alma Bengtsson/EBU)

Finishing just outside the top ten was another fan favourite in Finland’s Erika Vikman. I do think this suffered a similar curse to Sweden in that it was simply overhyped by much of the Eurovision community, however, I also wonder if the performance might have just seemed like a bit ‘too much’, or if Erika came across a bit manic as she rode her giant microphone into the sky. This is a song that should thrive in a live setting, yet didn’t really seem to at Eurovision, and again I think we can definitely have a future discussion about why that is. Just behind Erika were Claude from the Netherlands and Tautumeitas from Latvia; both entries that performed significantly better with the juries than with the televote. I was so pleased to see both of these entries recognised, particularly the exceptional vocals in “Bur man laimi”, which I had previously regarded as a borderline qualifier.

Heading up the right-hand side of the board was Poland, with Justyna Steczkowska and “Gaja”. This, like several previous Polish entries and other songs of its genre, was heavily penalised on the night by the juries. I think this can be attributed to a number of things, namely the slightly one-note nature of the song and general chaos that was the performance. Abor and Tynna from Germany defied the haters (me) to pull off a fifteenth-place finish, with a surprisingly high jury score. I will say that this package grew on me at Eurovision, and I do understand why it did this well. It’s also been nice to see “Baller” doing well commercially in a number of countries. There is then a bit of a gulf in points until we come to Lithuania’s Katarsis, who finished sixteenth and achieved a typically Lithuanian result by performing significantly better with the televote than the juries, no doubt aided on their way by diaspora voting.

Miriana Conte performed "Serving" in the Eurovision Song Contest 2025. (photo: Corrine Cumming/EBU)

Now we come to Malta, with Miriana Conte’s “Serving”. I spoke about the attention this song received pre-contest in my review blog, but this could only translate into a televote score on the night of eight points. Unfortunately, I think the novelty just wore off on this one. With the change from “Kant” to “Serving”, I think a huge part of the song’s appeal was lost, and it was no doubt hindered by the muting of the live audience. Like Poland, Malta threw everything at their stage show and it did feel a bit messy when it all happened at the same time. We know Malta struggle with the televote, so this shouldn’t have been a huge surprise, but I am glad that the juries gave Miriana’s vocals the recognition they deserved.

Another performance hindered by the sound mixing was, in my opinion, that of Kyle Alessandro from Norway. Performing first on the night, “Lighter” did much better with the televote than the juries, who may have been perturbed by the prominence of the backing vocal making it difficult at times to hear Kyle himself. Hot on his heels were the UK’s Remember Monday, finishing with another televote zero, in fact the second in a row for the UK. I think the girls should be very proud of what they did on stage: their vocals were excellent and they gave it everything they had, making them great representatives for the UK in my opinion. Where we go from here is something I want to think about in more detail on another day. Parg from Armenia was another qualifier that I didn’t predict, and one that got to its position, in my opinion, by being the only (and therefore best) song of its type in Eurovision this year: it successfully unlocked its target demographic and had no real competition there.

Remember Monday represented the UK in the Eurovision Song Contest 2025. (photo: Corrine Cumming/EBU)

Portugal’s Napa had already won the moment they were announced as a qualifier. Whilst “Deslocado” may not have done ever so well on the night, it was definitely a much-needed breath of fresh air and Portugal have extended their qualification streak once again. I have also read that the song has been gaining traction on TikTok, which is exciting. Laura Thorn from Luxembourg would perhaps be disappointed to find herself in the bottom five. Whilst her vocals weren’t perfect, I really thought the juries would get behind this more than they did. Performing second on the night surely didn’t help it with the televote either. Another country whose victory was being in the final was Denmark, qualifying for the first time since 2019 with Sissal’s “Hallucination”. This song did particularly poorly in the televote, and in my opinion failed to stand out in a crowded field.

Spain failed to get off the ground with “Esa diva”, and I think the problem was that other countries were doing similar things, but doing them better. Melody’s performance didn’t stick in enough people’s memories by the end of the night, as evidenced by the low televote score. Væb from Iceland seemed delighted to be performing on Saturday night, and probably cared very little about their nul points from the jury, although it was nice to see the televote giving them a bit of love. And bringing up the rear was Gabry Ponte of San Marino, who finished with 27 points, a fairly high score for last place. Of course, given the context of the song, it was helped significantly by Italy on the night but couldn’t pull in much support from elsewhere. However, it was nice to see San Marino in the final for only the fourth time, and to once and for all answer the question of how the Sanremo theme song would have done at Eurovision.

San Marino's Gabry Ponte finished last in the grand final of Eurovision 2025. (photo: Sarah Louise Bennett/EBU)

The semi-finals threw up a few surprises this year, and my predictions were, once again, rather inaccurate. Cyprus’ Theo Evan very narrowly missed out in the first semi-final, only two points behind San Marino. This was a bit of a shock to me, particularly as “Shh” closed the show, but I think fundamentally the song just wasn’t strong enough, and even a clever staging couldn’t save it. Croatia’s twelfth-place finish was probably more than many were expecting, but I never thought Marko would end up right at the bottom. He probably didn’t deserve to qualify but I hope he isn’t discouraged from coming back to Eurovision in the future. Slovenia’s Klemen also failed to connect with televoters – I do wonder if the song just felt a little bit too ‘on the nose’; to me, it didn’t have the subtlety required to allow listeners to really connect with the meaning.

The real surprise of this semi-final was probably Red Sebastian from Belgium, who ended up second to last with “Strobe Lights”. Despite a less than perfect vocal performance, I do think this deserved to qualify, and think it’s a real shame that Europe didn’t go for it on the night. Interestingly, 12 of Belgium’s 23 points came from the Sammarinese jury vote; and given this, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to assume that Red Sebastian may have finished in the top five of this semi-final with the juries, had they been voting. Could this have been enough to get him through? Stranger things have happened. And in last place was Azerbaijan, with Mamagama’s “Run With U”. Whilst I liked the song, the live performance left a lot to be desired, and I did identify this in my prediction as the least likely qualifier. Hopefully Azerbaijan can get back on track in Eurovision in the years to come.

Red Sebastian performing for Belgium in the first semi-final of Eurovision 2025. (photo: Sarah Louise Bennett/EBU)

Finishing eleventh in the second semi-final was Go-Jo from Australia, ten points behind Armenia. I was unashamedly quite pleased that this song didn’t get through, and think that the result was a combination of the usual televote disadvantage Australia seems to carry and the divisive nature of the song putting slightly too many people off. Somewhat ironically, given the song, I think this may have fared better with juries present. SBS clearly need to consider the direction they are taking in Eurovision, if they are to stay in the contest. Next, and not particularly close to Australia, was Czechia’s Adonxs. This is another song I really thought was going to make the cut, but Adonxs’ live performance wasn’t the best we’ve seen from him, and I did have my concerns about the song being too anonymous to make an impression on a first listen.

Behind Czechia was a three-way tie between Ireland, Serbia and Georgia. I wasn’t surprised that Emmy didn’t make it through, the song was weak and wasn’t aided at all by a performance that completely failed to create any of the necessary energy. I was, however, disappointed for Serbia, who ended up with their worst ever result. I still love “Mila”, and thought it had a chance, but it seems that on this occasion, the majority were right and it didn’t connect with the audience. Maybe I should listen more! Georgia’s Mariam Shengelia probably should have been last in this semi-final; I’ll get a bit more into the detailed results in a later post but suffice to say I don’t think “Freedom” would have done this well in the other semi-final. That being said, Montenegro only managed to score anything from their neighbours in Serbia, who awarded the maximum 12 points. Excluding the effects of diaspora and regional affinity, we can safely say that “Dobrodošli” would have finished with nul points this year.

Serbia's Princ failed to qualify for the final of Eurovision 2025. (photo: Corrine Cumming/EBU)

Overall, I think this year’s Eurovision Song Contest was a welcome return to something vaguely resembling sanity after the chaos of 2024; however, there is clearly still much that needs to be done. We narrowly avoided a major disaster in the form of an Israeli victory, and I think it’s evident that this can’t be allowed to continue. My position on Israel in the contest remains the same, but if the voting system is such that it allows for this blatant manipulation, then it must be changed. I have been glad to see that the EBU are conducting a review into the way in which the televote is conducted, and await the results of said review with baited breath.

Other than that, I really think this was a brilliant final. Whilst it wasn’t the line-up I was expecting, there isn’t really a single song that I can complain about being there, and I can understand why all of the non-qualifiers fell short in the end. Again, the hosts did a fantastic job and it was nice to see how Switzerland approached a modern contest. We all now shift our attention to Austria, and its national broadcaster ORF. Of course, we saw ORF hosting relatively recently and I think there are definitely things that need to be done differently from the 2015 production, however, I also think it’s fairly safe to say that we should be in safe hands once again.

So what’s next for this blog? Well, in the immediate future, I’m hoping to produce some more detailed results analyses of this year’s contest: beginning with the semi-finals, then examining both sides of the final voting in more depth. After then, it will probably be a bit of a mixture of things – I do want to write some reviews of previous contests, and would also be very interested in producing some more statistics-based articles. Let me know either here or on Bluesky if there’s anything you would be particularly eager to see from me. Anyway, thank you if you have read this far; hopefully you have enjoyed following the blog this Eurovision season, and if so then please do keep an eye out for all those articles mentioned above, coming very soon.