“In-Depth Analysis of Eurovision Song Contest 2023: Striking Points Tables and Voting System Changes”

The Eurovision Song Contest 2023 has ended and all results are known. It is high time to reflect on the most striking things that we find in the points tables of the 67^e edition.

Let’s repeat the voting system, which was changed this year. For the first time since 2009, there were differences between how to vote in the three different live shows.

In the semi-finals, only the viewers at home voted. It was of course always about the participants themselves, supplemented by three of the six countries that were already certain of a place in the final and the brand new Rest of the World-stemming. People with a credit card registered in a non-participating country could participate in online decisions. Their votes were reduced to a point set of one to twelve points.

Voted again in the final five-member expert juries from all 37 countries along. This year they determined 49% of the final result. The majority came from televoting, from all 37 countries plus the separate global vote.

Below we summarize the most striking things from the points lists per broadcast. You can now find all the points given and received from the Eurovision Song Contest 2023 on our website. At the time of publication, no detailed country rankings have been announced, only the top ten.

1st semi-final

In the first semi-final we can already see the general trend of the year: the audience was very concentrated. With a total of three, four, seven and ten points collected respectively, Malta, Azerbaijan, the Netherlands and Ireland played anything but a significant role. Serbia and Latvia battled for the coveted tenth place, which was decided in Luke Black’s favor by just three points.

The highest ranked countries took almost all the points. Käärijä from Finland in particular fulfilled his role as a crowd favorite with verve by finishing in the top five in every voting country. In the end, the entire top five in the ranking also received points from all other countries.

Other notable things: the Croats broke the usually strong Balkan bloc by classifying Finland above neighboring Serbia, Sudden Lights from Latvia was particularly appreciated by the overall mood and despite her ‘only’ ninth place in the final standings, the Portuguese Mimicat still managed to score two top scores .

2e half finale

No zeros in the final this year, but in the second semi. Theodor from Romania and Piqued Jacks from San Marino each received the red lantern. Reiley from Denmark was only spared that fate by the loyal friends from Iceland and the Greek candidate Victor Vernicos was only saved from the zero points by Cyprus and Armenia.

Georgia and Iceland finished closest to the finals, but still at a good distance. The difference between the eleventh and tenth place, of Alika from Estonia, was thirty points. Here too we see that all points were reserved for the top half of the standings and there was unanimity about the favourites. However, only the top two, Australia and Austria, were awarded points by all other voting countries.

Belgium gathered ninety points, but only finished eight^e in the ranking. Viewers in every voting country except the Romanians placed Gustaph in their top ten of the second semi-final. Austria even awarded us the full pot of twelve pointswhich was kindly returned to Teya & Salena by the Belgian jury in the final.

It is striking that the top scores in this second semi were less pronounced for close neighboring countries. Joker Out boys from Slovenia received top scores from Poland, Romania and Spain, while Voyager’s slightly older men and lady from Australia were named favorites by Estonia, Iceland and Albania.

Final: professional juries

From the grand finale we can compare the points of the viewers with those of the professional juries. This year, the Belgian professional jury consisted of Alex Callier (musician and Belgian entry ESF 2021, Hooverphonic), Laura Groeseneken (singer, ESF 2018, Sennek), Laura Govaerts (dj at MNM), Sam Jaspers (founder Ultratop and music consultant) and Lester Williams (guitarist). In the Netherlands, Samya Hafsaoui, Jeroen Kijk in de Vegte, Sjamke de Voogd, Rob Dekay and Froukje voted as experts.

The experts opted en masse for Sweden. Loreen received the top score from fifteen of the 36 juries and an average of 9.4 points per country, with twelve as the maximum. She scored almost twice as many points as Noa Kirel from Israel, who finished one point ahead of Italy’s Marco Mengoni. The Germans were awarded only three points and thus ended dismal last in the jury vote.

It is striking that the juries were also regularly sympathetic to the neighbours. The Latvian jury chose Italy for Estonia, San Marino and Austria. The Scandinavian experts were especially fond of each other; for example, the top three of the Danish jury consisted of Finland, Norway and Sweden.

Conversely, neighbors also regularly let it down. Gustaph only got four points from the Netherlands and none from France or Germany. Slovenia gave nothing to Serbia and the Greek jury only had four points for Cyprus. That is Greece’s lowest score for Cyprus since 1983.

Finale: televoting

The differences with the public points were once again stark. At the top, Finland raked in 376 points from the televoting, or 10.2 points per country. In comparison, Kalush Orchestra’s record score amounted to 11.2 audience points per country.

Final winner Sweden lagged behind with an average of 6.5 points per country and did not receive the top score from any country. It is the first time ever since the introduction of televoting in 1997 that the eventual winner was not voted a favorite by the public in any country. It is also very striking that Loreen received no points at all from only one voting country: neighboring country Finland. Conversely, the Swedes gave Cha Cha Cha well de topscore.

Norwegian candidate Alessandra benefited the most from the televoting, with 216 points against only 52 from the juries. TVORCHI from Ukraine, Let 3 from Croatia and Blanka from Poland also fared better at home. Conversely, the juries were much more swooning at Alika from Estonia, Voyager from Australia, Teya & Salena from Austria, Blanca Paloma from Spain (who finished last in the televoting) and our own Gustaph.

In the final, our country had to be satisfied with a twelfth place among the viewers at home. But in the final classification, the seventh place, previously awarded by the professional juries, remained intact. It is also remarkable that, despite the eighth place in the second semi-final, Belgium overtook all those countries in the final. All other countries that had pushed through on Thursday evening eventually stranded under our country.

This also immediately makes it clear that the audience in all countries clearly thought the first semi-final was the better one. With an eighth place, Poland finished highest of all countries from semi two in the televoting in the final. Finally, we note a bizarre downward trend in Australia and Austria. The countries finished first and second in their semi-finals, but only finished 20th and 22nd in the public vote on Saturday evening.

Rest of the World

Finally, we look separately at the international votes. It is currently unknown from how many countries how many people voted. The chance that there will be much transparency about this is small. We only got the overall top ten that came out of the vote.

In the end, the global points didn’t make a dent in a packet of butter. In the first semi-final they did not make any difference in the ranking. In the second they took the Kelmendis from tenth to ninth place. Brunette from Armenia eventually did the best business by rising from fifteenth to fourteenth place in the final standings thanks to eight points in the final.

Otherwise it was the RotWpoints that the gentlemen of The Busker from Malta gave one of their three points and they were also single-handedly responsible for forty percent of all Spanish audience points, or two out of five. Finally, both in the first semi-final and in the final, the global voters did not choose favorites Sweden or Finland, but Israel.

All results of the 67th Eurovision Song Contest can be found below