Spain in the Eurovision Song Contest

Spain has been represented at the Eurovision Song Contest 64 times, debuting in the 1961 contest and participating every year thereafter until 2025. The Spanish participating broadcaster in the contest was Radiotelevisión Española (RTVE). Spain was one of the "Big Five" countries, along with France, Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom, automatically prequalified for the final, due to their participating broadcasters being the largest financial contributors to the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). By the end of 2025, the country opted not to participate in the contest for the first time since its debut due to the inclusion of Israel in the context of the Gaza war, thereby reducing the number of "Big" countries to four.

Spain in the Eurovision Song Contest
Eurovision Song Contest
Participating broadcaster	Radiotelevisión Española (RTVE; 2007–2025) Formerly Televisión Española (TVE; 1961–2006)
Participation summary
Appearances	64
First appearance	1961
Last appearance	2025
Highest placement	1st: 1968, 1969
Host	1969
Participation history 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
Related articles
Benidorm Fest Operación Triunfo
External links
RTVE page
Spain's page at Eurovision.tv

Spain has won the contest twice, first in 1968 with the song "La La La" performed by Massiel and again in 1969, when "Vivo cantando" by Salomé was involved in a four-way tie with France, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. The 1969 contest in Madrid is the only time Spain has hosted the event, since lots were drawn after 1969's four-way tie and the 1970 contest was hosted by the Netherlands. Other good results in the 20th century were four second places with "En un mundo nuevo" by Karina in 1971, "Eres tú" by Mocedades in 1973, "Su canción" by Betty Missiego in 1979, and "Vuelve conmigo" by Anabel Conde in 1995, and a third place with "Lady, Lady" by Bravo in 1984. The country finished last with nul points three times: in 1962, 1965, and 1983, and also finished last in 1999 and 2017.

Since the start of the 21st century, Spain has reached the top ten seven times, with "Dile que la quiero" by David Civera (2001) finishing sixth, "Europe's Living a Celebration" by Rosa (2002) finishing seventh, "Dime" by Beth (2003) finishing eighth, "Para llenarme de ti" by Ramón (2004) finishing tenth, both "Quédate conmigo" by Pastora Soler (2012) and "Dancing in the Rain" by Ruth Lorenzo (2014) also finishing tenth, and "SloMo" by Chanel (2022) finishing third. Spain has also failed to reach the top twenty in ten of the last eighteen contests, including for six consecutive contests (2015–21). With "Eaea" by Blanca Paloma placing 17th in 2023, Spain became the first country to finish in all possible positions in the final (1st–26th). Spain is the country with the longest active victory drought, spanning over a total of 56 years (1969–2025).

Participation

Televisión Española (TVE) was a full member of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), thus eligible to participate in the Eurovision Song Contest. It participated in the contest representing Spain since its sixth edition in 1961. Since 2007, after a restructuring that led to the incorporation of TVE into the current Radiotelevisión Española (RTVE) corporation, it is the latter who participates representing Spain.

Selection process

Spain has regularly changed the selection process used in order to find the country's entry for the contest, either a national final or internal selection (sometimes a combination of both formats) has been held by the broadcaster at the time. Between 1977 and 1999, Spain's entries were selected internally by TVE. Before that, internal selections and national contests, like Pasaporte a Dublín (Passport to Dublin) in 1971, were alternated.

From 2000, Spain has used various selection formats with different results. In 2000 and 2001, TVE organised a national final called Eurocanción (Eurosong), where the Spanish representative was selected for the contest. From 2002 to 2004, the reality television talent competition Operación Triunfo (the Spanish version of Star Academy) was used to select the entry, a format that renewed the Spanish audience's interest in the contest and brought three top 10 results in a row, until TVE decided not to host any further editions of the series. In 2005, the national final Eurovisión 2005: Elige nuestra canción (Eurovision 2005: Choose Our Song) was organised, where the audience chose their favourite song among a pre-selection made by TVE of unknown artists submitted to them by record labels. The result in the Eurovision final was not good and for 2006, the selection was made internally for the first time since 1999, with a similar result. In 2007, Spain's entry was decided through the Misión Eurovisión 2007 show, with a disappointing result once again.

From 2008 to 2010, the Internet was the key element of the competitions used by RTVE to select the Spanish entry. In 2008, the social networking website MySpace was involved in the national final Salvemos Eurovisión (Let's Save Eurovision). A website was created to make it possible for anyone to upload a song and proceed to a televised final if chosen by online voters or an expert jury. The result improved a little, but not much; nevertheless the interest of the Spanish audience was revived again. For 2009, MySpace was still involved in the selection process Eurovisión 2009: El retorno (Eurovision 2009: The Return), although some changes were introduced in the format. The result was the worst in the 2000s (decade): 24th place. In 2010, a similar format, Eurovisión: Destino Oslo, selected the Spanish entry, with the best result since 2004 (15th).

In 2011, Internet voting was scrapped from the new selection method Destino Eurovisión. After a further disappointing result (23rd), for 2012, RTVE decided to approach an established act, Pastora Soler, and organise a national final to select her song. A top ten result was achieved for the first time since 2004. The same procedure was repeated in 2013, with El Sueño de Morfeo as the established act, which turned out one of the most disappointing results (25th out of 26 entries) in the country's Eurovision history; some critics, however, blamed a less-than-stellar performance of an otherwise solid song. In 2014, RTVE decided to return to a multi-artist national final procedure, called Mira quién va a Eurovisión (Look who's going to Eurovision); five artists were invited to participate by RTVE. A top ten result was achieved for the second time in three years.

In 2015, for the first time since 2006, both the artist, Edurne, and the song were selected internally by RTVE. On 18 December 2015, RTVE announced that it would organise a national final in order to select the Spanish entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 2016. Six acts competed in the national final named Objetivo Eurovisión, and Barei won the selection process. The same format was used in 2017, and Manel Navarro won the selection process; it turned out Spain's first last-place result since 1999.

In 2017, RTVE commissioned a new season of Operación Triunfo, which returned to TVE after thirteen years, and the series served for the fourth time (after 2002, 2003 and 2004) as the platform to select the Spanish entry for the 2018 contest. The result was disappointing (23rd out of 26 entries), but the 2018 Eurovision final was the most-watched in Spain since 2008. A further season of the talent show chose the Spanish entry for the 2019 contest with another disappointing result (22nd out of 26 entries).

For the 2020 contest, RTVE selected the Spanish entry internally, with Blas Cantó and the song "Universo" chosen. Following the cancellation of the contest due to the COVID-19 pandemic, RTVE was one of the first four broadcasters (the other were Greece's ERT, Netherlands' AVROTROS and Ukraine's UA:PBC) that confirmed its participation for the 2021 edition with the same artist who would have participated for 2020, in this case Cantó. His 2021 entry "Voy a quedarme" went on to finish in 24th place with six points, marking the sixth time in a row that Spain has finished outside of the top twenty.

For the 2022 contest, it was announced that RTVE would use Benidorm Fest, a revamped version of the Benidorm International Song Festival to select the nation's entry among thirteen candidates. The broadcaster signed a contract with the regional government of the Valencian Community to hold the event for four editions. The first Benidorm Fest was won by Chanel with "SloMo", which finished in third place at Eurovision with 459 points, thereby achieving Spain's best Eurovision result since 1995.

Spain and the "Big Five"

Since 1999, Spain, along with France, Germany, and the United Kingdom, have automatically qualified for the Eurovision final regardless of their results in previous contests. The participating broadcasters from these countries earned this special status by being the four biggest financial contributors to the EBU, and subsequently became known as the "Big Four". Italy returned to the contest in 2011, resulting in the countries becoming members of a "Big Five".

Interrupted performances

Only three times in the contest's history has a non-winning entry been allowed to perform again, and in two of these instances, the entries in question were Spanish representatives (the other one being the Italian entry in 1958, "Nel blu, dipinto di blu" by Domenico Modugno). The first time this happened to a Spanish representative was in the 1990 contest in Zagreb, when Azúcar Moreno opened the contest with the song "Bandido". The orchestra and the recorded backing track began the song out of sync, which caused the singers to miss their cue. The singers left the stage after a few seconds, and no explanation was given at the time. After a few uneasy moments, the music began correctly and the song was performed in full. Azúcar Moreno and "Bandido" went on to place fifth in the final vote tally, though the juries at the time actually awarded their points after watching the dress rehearsal performances, so the restart did not affect Spain's overall result either positively or negatively.

Twenty years later, at the 2010 contest in Oslo, Spain was drawn to perform second in the running order, and Daniel Diges's performance of "Algo pequeñito" was disturbed by Catalan pitch invader Jimmy Jump. However, Diges performed the song in full, despite the invader's intrusion and subsequent removal from the stage by security personnel, receiving warm applause for continuing from the audience at the Telenor Arena. After Serbia's performance, co-presenter Nadia Hasnaoui announced that, according to the rules, Diges would be given a second chance once all the remaining countries had performed. Nonetheless, the juries ranked the dress-rehearsal performance of "Algo pequeñito" 20th out of 25 with 43 points, whereas the televoting results ranked Spain 12th, with 106 points. The combination of jury and televote results gave Spain a 15th-place finish.

Participation overview

Table key

1	First place
2	Second place
3	Third place
◁	Last place
X	Entry selected but did not compete

Year	Artist	Song	Language	Final	Points	Semi	Points
1961	Conchita Bautista	"Estando contigo"	Spanish	9	8	No semi-finals
1962	Víctor Balaguer	"Llámame"	Spanish	13 ◁	0
1963	José Guardiola	"Algo prodigioso"	Spanish	12	2
1964	Nelly with Tim and Tony	"Caracola"	Spanish	12	1
1965	Conchita Bautista	"Qué bueno, qué bueno"	Spanish	15 ◁	0
1966	Raphael	"Yo soy aquél"	Spanish	7	9
1967	Raphael	"Hablemos del amor"	Spanish	6	9
1968	Massiel	"La La La"	Spanish	1	29
1969	Salomé	"Vivo cantando"	Spanish	1	18
1970	Julio Iglesias	"Gwendolyne"	Spanish	4	8
1971	Karina	"En un mundo nuevo"	Spanish	2	116
1972	Jaime Morey	"Amanece"	Spanish	10	83
1973	Mocedades	"Eres tú"	Spanish	2	125
1974	Peret	"Canta y sé feliz"	Spanish	9	10
1975	Sergio and Estíbaliz	"Tú volverás"	Spanish	10	53
1976	Braulio	"Sobran las palabras"	Spanish	16	11
1977	Micky	"Enséñame a cantar"	Spanish	9	52
1978	José Vélez	"Bailemos un vals"	Spanish	9	65
1979	Betty Missiego	"Su canción"	Spanish	2	116
1980	Trigo Limpio	"Quédate esta noche"	Spanish	12	38
1981	Bacchelli	"Y sólo tú"	Spanish	14	38
1982	Lucía	"Él"	Spanish	10	52
1983	Remedios Amaya	"Quién maneja mi barca"	Spanish	19 ◁	0
1984	Bravo	"Lady, Lady"	Spanish	3	106
1985	Paloma San Basilio	"La fiesta terminó"	Spanish	14	36
1986	Cadillac	"Valentino"	Spanish	10	51
1987	Patricia Kraus	"No estás solo"	Spanish	19	10
1988	La Década	"La chica que yo quiero (Made in Spain)"	Spanish	11	58
1989	Nina	"Nacida para amar"	Spanish	6	88
1990	Azúcar Moreno	"Bandido"	Spanish	5	96
1991	Sergio Dalma	"Bailar pegados"	Spanish	4	119
1992	Serafín	"Todo esto es la música"	Spanish	14	37
1993	Eva Santamaría	"Hombres"	Spanish	11	58	Kvalifikacija za Millstreet
1994	Alejandro Abad	"Ella no es ella"	Spanish	18	17	No semi-finals
1995	Anabel Conde	"Vuelve conmigo"	Spanish	2	119
1996	Antonio Carbonell	"Ay, qué deseo"	Spanish	20	17	14	43
1997	Marcos Llunas	"Sin rencor"	Spanish	6	96	No semi-finals
1998	Mikel Herzog	"¿Qué voy a hacer sin ti?"	Spanish	16	21
1999	Lydia	"No quiero escuchar"	Spanish	23 ◁	1
2000	Serafín Zubiri	"Colgado de un sueño"	Spanish	18	18
2001	David Civera	"Dile que la quiero"	Spanish	6	76
2002	Rosa	"Europe's Living a Celebration"	Spanish	7	81
2003	Beth	"Dime"	Spanish	8	81
2004	Ramón	"Para llenarme de ti"	Spanish	10	87	Member of the "Big Four"
2005	Son de Sol	"Brujería"	Spanish	21	28
2006	Las Ketchup	"Bloody Mary"	Spanish	21	18
2007	D'Nash	"I Love You Mi Vida"	Spanish	20	43
2008	Rodolfo Chikilicuatre	"Baila el Chiki Chiki"	Spanish, English	16	55
2009	Soraya Arnelas	"La noche es para mí"	Spanish	24	23
2010	Daniel Diges	"Algo pequeñito"	Spanish	15	68
2011	Lucía Pérez	"Que me quiten lo bailao"	Spanish	23	50	Member of the "Big Five"
2012	Pastora Soler	"Quédate conmigo"	Spanish	10	97
2013	ESDM	"Contigo hasta el final"	Spanish	25	8
2014	Ruth Lorenzo	"Dancing in the Rain"	English, Spanish	10	74
2015	Edurne	"Amanecer"	Spanish	21	15
2016	Barei	"Say Yay!"	English	22	77
2017	Manel Navarro	"Do It for Your Lover"	Spanish, English	26 ◁	5
2018	Amaia and Alfred	"Tu canción"	Spanish	23	61
2019	Miki	"La venda"	Spanish	22	54
2020	Blas Cantó	"Universo"	Spanish	Contest cancelled X
2021	Blas Cantó	"Voy a quedarme"	Spanish	24	6
2022	Chanel	"SloMo"	Spanish, English	3	459
2023	Blanca Paloma	"Eaea"	Spanish	17	100
2024	Nebulossa	"Zorra"	Spanish	22	30
2025	Melody	"Esa diva"	Spanish	24	37

Congratulations: 50 Years of the Eurovision Song Contest

Artist	Song	Language	At Congratulations				At Eurovision
			Final	Points	Semi	Points	Year	Place	Points
Mocedades	"Eres tú"	Spanish	Failed to qualify		11	90	1973	2	125

Trivia

Songs by language