As of today nobody has found a bullet proof formula to win the Eurovision Song Contest. The song, the performance and the staging are the most obvious success criteria, but we all know that this time of year another criterion is what we are all talking about – the running order. A starting position at the end of the event is thought to be a guaranteed qualification, while starting in the first half is held to be unfavorable.
The Numbers
But what do the numbers actually say? Looking at the success rate of starting positions is not so straight forward. From 2004 to 2007 the competition only had a single semi final, which is skewing the data a bit. If we assume that starting in the last positions is favorable, then it matters for the statistics whether there were 26 or 18 entries. Further complicating matters is that there is a variable number of entries per year even after the dual semi finals were introduced.
The changes in the voting system in 2008 and 2009 have also biased the qualifications stats on some starting positions. For these 2 years only top 9 in the Tele Vote was guaranteed a spot in the Final, while the last country to qualify was decided by the back-up juries.
In 2008, Sweden (R/O 2) qualified at the expense of FYR Macedonia (R/O 18) in semi final 2. In 2009 Finland (R/O 15) qualified at the expense of FYR Macedonia (R/O 13) in semi final 1 and Croatia (R/O 1) qualified at the expense of Serbia (R/O 4) in semi final 2. As a consequence starting in position 15 in semi final 1 and position 1 and 2 in Semi Final 2 has benefited from an artificial boost in the statistics.
Semi Final 1 vs. Semi Final 2
Surprisingly there is a tremendous yet inexplicable difference between the success rate of a position, depending on whether it is in semi final 1 or semi final 2.
Below is a chart of starting positions and their respective success rate for semi finals. The blue bars are the overall success rate for all semi finals and the pink bars indicate the success rate of a position in semi final 2 exclusively.
Position 2 in the running order is often called the “draw of death”. However the statistics of the Semi Finals tell another story. In Semi Final 1 position 1, 4 and 11 all have lower qualification rates than position 2 and overall position 3, 4 and 11 all have lower qualification success rates.
As with #semi final 1 we can see that is still a slight advantage to start at the very end of the show. However it seems that the success rate of the remaining positions is more equally distributed. The worst statistical chances are still found in the first half, but not with the bleak 25% we saw for position 4 in semi final 1.
Again, if starting position were all that mattered we would be seeing 100% and 0% bars. It is curious that the qualification success rates are more equally distributed in semi final 2 compared to semi final 1. Maybe more people who vote watch semi final 2?
As for position 7, Denmark’s Leonora, it looks like she has a 50/50 chance to qualify based on the history of the position. That’s not great but not terrible either.
Predicted Qualifiers according to Running Order
Based on the historic success of each position, we can try to predict the qualifiers from semi final 2. In order of success chance, the qualifiers should be
- Azerbaijan (88%)
- Romania (75%)
- Russia (75%)
- Albania (75%)
- Armenia (67%)
- Switzerland (67%)
- Norway (67%)
- North Macedonia (64%)
- Ireland / Sweden / Lithuania (58%)
Ireland, Sweden and Lithuania are all tied for 9th place at a 58% chance. Looks like the 50% chance based on running order is not going to be even close to enough for Leonora to qualify. Good thing we can expect the competition to be about more than the order of the entries.
| Country | R/O | Overall % | Semi 2 % |
|---|---|---|---|
 | 1 | 50 % | 62 % |
 | 2 | 46 % | 54 % |
 | 3 | 36 % | 38 % |
 | 4 | 46 % | 69 % |
 | 5 | 50 % | 38 % |
 | 6 | 64 % | 69 % |
 | 7 | 57 % | 54 % |
 | 8 | 54 % | 62 % |
 | 9 | 57 % | 46 % |
 | 10 | 61 % | 46 % |
 | 11 | 43 % | 54 % |
 | 12 | 57 % | 54 % |
 | 13 | 68 % | 77 % |
 | 14 | 75 % | 77 % |
 | 15 | 71 % | 69 % |
 | 16 | 52 % | 58 % |
 | 17 | 58 % | 67 % |
 | 18 | 84 % | 88 % |
| These countries may vote |
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