The draw for allocating the countries that will compete in the 2023 Eurovision Song Contest semi-finals will be held today at 20:00 PM CET at Liverpool’s iconic St. George’s Hall. The draw will be streamed live via YouTube.
The Host Insignia Handover Ceremony will be held prior to the Semi-final Allocation Draw at St. George’s Hall.
Both the Semi-final Allocation Draw and the Host Insignia Ceremony will be conducted by Rylan and AJ Odudu.
Host Insignia Handover Ceremony
The Mayor of Turin, Mr. Stefano Lo Russo, will officially hand over the keys to the Mayor of Liverpool, Joanne Anderson, at St. George’s Hall .
A grand ceremony has been organized for the occasion, where Liverpool will officially take over from Turin as the Eurovision host city.
The ceremony will be carried out in the presence of Mr. Martin Osterdahl (Eurovision Song Contest Executive Supervisor) who will give a short speech on behalf of the EBU.
How to watch?
You can watch the Semi-final Allocation Draw live at 20: 00 PM CET via the following channels:
Pot distribution
The 31 semi-final competing countries have been divided and distributed into 6 pots specially for the draw.
The distribution of the countries in the 6 pots has been based on the voting pattern in each country in the past years. This mechanism is used in order to avoid neighborly voting and countries that tend to vote for each another ending up competing in the same Semi-final.
Which country is in which pot?
Pot 1
- Albania
- Austria
- Switzerland
- Croatia
- Serbia
- Slovenia
Pot 2
- Denmark
- Australia
- Finland
- Iceland
- Norway
- Sweden
- Estonia
Pot 3
- Armenia
- Azerbaijan
- Georgia
- Israel
- Latvia
- Lithuania
Pot 4
- Cyprus
- Greece
- Ireland
- Malta
- Portugal
- San Marino
Pot 5
- Belgium
- Czech Republic
- Netherlands
- Moldova
- Poland
- Romania
Semi-final Allocation Draw
A total 31 countries have been distributed into 6 pots and will be allocated into one of the 2 semi-finals by a draw. The first draw will determine which country will compete in which semi-final.
Sixteen countries will compete in one semi-final whilst fifteen countries will compete in the other semi-final The draw will be supervised by the Eurovision Song Contest Executive Supervisor Mr. Martin Osterdahl.
Another draw will determine the appearance of the country in its respective semi-final (1st half or 2nd half of the semi-final).
Big 5 + Ukraine semi-final draw
The Big 5 (Italy, France, UK, Spain and Germany) and Ukraine countries will vote in the semi-finals too.
A draw will also determine which country will vote in which semi-final.
Eurovision 2023
A total of 37 countries will compete at the 2023 Eurovision Song Contest in Liverpool next May. 31 countries will compete in the semi-finals, whilst 26 countries will compete in the Grand Final.
The exact running order of the 31 countries competing in the 2 semi-finals on 9 and 11 May will be determined by the producers of the show by late March.
The Big 5 (Spain, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy) and Ukraine are automatically qualified to compete in the Grand Final on 13 May.
The 2023 Eurovision Song Contest is scheduled to be held on 09, 11 and 13 May at the Liverpool Arena in Liverpool, England.
Cover photo credit: EBU/BBC
