Portugal: Bandidos do Cante confirms participation at Eurovision 2026

This morning, the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) announced that the winners of Festival da Canção 2026, Bandidos do Cante, will take part in the Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna this May.

A rule change to the festival this year made it so the winner of Festival da Canção 2026 will merely be "eligible" to participate at the Eurovision Song Contest. This mimics the process in other participating countries such as Italy, where the winner of the Sanremo Music Festival only receives the right of refusal to participate at Eurovision.

On 10 December, 17 artists (between them representing 12 of the acts at this year's national final) signed an open letter confirming that they would boycott participation at the 2026 Eurovision Song Contest.

Bandidos do Cante were just one of two acts to confirm before Festival da Canção that they would compete at Eurovision 2026 if they won.

A detailed explanation of the events at the festival can be found here.

The quintet hailing from the region of Alentejo in southern Portugal comprises of childhood friends Miguel Costa, Duarte Farias, Francisco Raposo, Luís Aleixo and Francisco Pestana whose music is influenced with 'Cante Alentejano', a traditional way of singing in Alentejo (recognised by UNESCO as Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity), The group have 200,000 monthly listeners and has recently completed a tour, with over 80 concerts. They released their debut album Bairro das Flores in January 2026. Bandidos do Cante will perform in the first half of the first semi-final at Eurovision 2026.

Portugal at Eurovision

Portugal has competed 54 times since their debut in 1964 and has won the Eurovision Song Contest once with Salvador Sobral and Amar pelos dois in 2017.

Last year Portugal was represented by NAPA with Deslocado which finished in 21st place.

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