Who does Australia want to draw in the Eurovision 2026 semi-final allocation?

The Eurovision semi-final allocation draw takes place overnight but who does Australia want to draw in the semi-final?

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On Tuesday morning (Australian time), the semi-final allocation draw takes place in Vienna ahead of the Eurovision Song Contest in May.

It's one of the most significant events in the Eurovision calendar ahead of the actual Contest.

It'll determine which semi-final Australia is in and which countries we are up against.

How the draw works

The semi-final allocation draw is done by pulling out nations at random from pre-decided pots of six nations.

These pots are based on previous voting patterns to avoid nations having too many "friends" in one semi-final (e.g. all the Balkan nations won't be placed in the same semi-final).

Australia has been placed in, the Nordic (+Estonia) pot where we traditionally share votes.

We will draw three nations from each pot apart from our own (where we only draw two), plus the Big 4 and hosts Austria will also be placed into semi-finals to vote on.

How do we know who we want or don't want?

We looked at how every country has voted for Australia at Eurovision since 2015.

Instead of just adding up the total points a country gave us, we asked a slightly smarter question:

Did they vote for Australia more or less than the average country did in the same year?

Why does that matter?

Because some years Australia does really well and gets lots of points from almost everyone, and other years we don’t.

So for each contest:

• We worked out the average points Australia received

• Then compared how each country voted against that average

If a country regularly gave Australia more points than the average, they’re a strong supporter.If they consistently gave less than the average, they’re not exactly on Team Australia.

This lets us see real voting patterns, not just who happened to give us a big score once or twice.

Who we do and don't want to draw

A country’s score shows how many points above or below the Eurovision average it has voted for Australia since 2015. Positive means friendly, negative means not so much.

Pot 1

Best:

Albania +0.02

Others we’d like to draw:

Switzerland -0.25

Not great, but could be worse:

Bulgaria -1.35

Croatia -1.53

Who we want to avoid:

Montenegro -3.73

Serbia -2.84

Pot 2

Best:

Sweden +4.50

Others we’d like to draw:

Finland +3.27

Denmark +2.86

Not as great, but could be worse:

Norway +1.79

Who we'd prefer not to get

Estonia +1.08

Pot 3

Best:

Poland +2.67

Others that would be good to draw:

Israel +1.88

Ukraine +0.89

Not great, but could be worse:

Azerbaijan -1.88

Who we want to avoid:

Georgia -4.03

Armenia -3.95

Pot 4

Best:

Moldova +1.37

Others we’d like to draw:

Belgium +0.98

Romania +0.49

Not great, but could be worse:

Portugal -0.22

Who we want to avoid:

Czechia -1.05

Luxembourg -0.72

Pot 5

Best:

Malta +1.19

Others we’d like to draw:

Latvia +0.48

Lithuania +0.02

Not great, but could be worse:

Cyprus -0.69

Who we want to avoid:

San Marino -1.62

Greece -1.20

Big Four + Hosts

Best:

United Kingdom +2.12

Others we’d like to draw:

Germany +1.72

Not great, but could be worse

France -0.30

Who we want to avoid:

Italy -2.37

Austria -0.94

Overall best case scenario

Pot 1

Albania

Switzerland

Bulgaria

Pot 2 (Australia’s pot – two only)

Sweden

Finland

Pot 3

Poland

Israel

Ukraine

Pot 4

Moldova

Belgium

Romania

Pot 5

Malta

Latvia

Lithuania

Big four plus host (voters)

United Kingdom

Germany

Overall worst case scenario

Pot 1

Montenegro

Serbia

Croatia

Pot 2 (Australia’s pot – two only)

Estonia

Norway

Pot 3

Georgia

Armenia

Azerbaijan

Pot 4

Czechia

Luxembourg

Portugal

Pot 5

San Marino

Greece

Cyprus

Big four plus host (voters)

Italy

Austria

France

When and where to watch

The semi-final draw will be available to watch on YouTube from 05:00am AEDT.

For continued updates on all Eurovision Song Contest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, YouTube, Bluesky and Instagram. All the links can be found at: https://linktr.ee/aussievisionnet