Weird and Wonderful Eurovision History - 10 Fun Facts

Eurovision is a celebration of all things weird and wonderful and we can't help but love it! So it seems only fitting to celebrate Eurovision week 2026 with 10 weird and wonderful facts from Eurovision's long and sparkling history. We recommend perusing this list whilst toe-tapping and head-bopping to a playlist of this year's Eurovision songs on your favourite music streaming service:

Top 10 Eurovision Facts:

The winner of the first ever Eurovision song contest - image courtesy Eurovoix

The first Eurovision only featured 7 countries

With 35 countries competing in Eurovision 2026, and the largest ever contests (in 2008, 2011 and 2018) featuring a whopping 43 countries, it’s hard to imagine that the first ever Eurovision in 1956 took place with only 7 taking part; Switzerland, Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and west Germany.

Luxembourg’s 5 winners weren’t from Luxembourg

That’s right – Luxembourg have won the contest a whopping five times in total but none of their winners were locals! Four were French - Jean-Claude Pascal (1961), France Gall (1965), Anne-Marie David (1973), Corinne Hermès (1983) - and one was Greek - Vicky Leandros (1972).

Cyprus have never had a win

Cyprus holds the title for being the longest loser at Eurovision with the record for the most appearances in the contest without a win. But Cyprus is not alone, there are many other countries that have never had a win, with Malta coming in a close second place in the “most appearances without a win” competition behind the Cypriots.

 

Nathalie Paque, 11 years old, performs at Eurovision - image courtesy Eurovision Universe

There’s an 84-year difference between the oldest and youngest contestants

Eurovision’s oldest contestant was Emil Ramsauer who performed in the music group, Takasa for Switzerland in 2013. He was 95 years old! By contrast, Eurovision’s youngest contestant was Nathalie Pâque who represented France in 1989 at just 11 years old. In 1990, the rules changed requiring contestants to be at least 16 years old to compete in the main contest and later, a Junior Eurovision contest was introduced for youngsters wanting to compete.

Eurovision is in the Guiness World Record Book

In 2015, the Eurovision Song Contest took its place in the Guiness World Records as being the Longest Running Annual TV Music Competition. The competition has only ever been cancelled once, in 2020, because of the COVID-19 outbreak.

Bucks Fizz show off their famous rip-away skirts - Image courtesy BBC

Eurovision sold out Velcro

In 1981, the UK’s entrant, Bucks Fizz, performed at the competition wearing their now-famous Velcro rip-away skirts. The fun costumes were so popular that Velcro had sold out across the UK within 48 hours of their performance with people wanting to re-create the outfits at home.

Two countries battle it out for the most wins

On the winning end of the stats are Ireland and Sweden who have both won the competition a stonking seven times each! The United Kingdom, who fall behind Ireland and Sweden with only five Eurovision wins to date, take the trophy for the country with the most near-misses, having finished second sixteen times.

The 1969 winners from four different countries pose together

There are more winners than there have been competitions

Since Austria’s win in 2026, here have been 69 Eurovision contests but 72 winners! If you’re wondering how that can be possible, it’s all down to the 1969 competition which saw a tie between the UK, Spain, the Netherlands and France who all won with the same score. Nowadays, there are extra tie-breaker rules to prevent this from happening again.

Artists used to sing in their national language

For many years, the Eurovision rules stated that artists had to sing in the national language from the country they were representing at the competition. This was considered quite restrictive for most countries (though not for Switzerland who have four different official languages!) and the rule was changed in 1999. Nowadays, a large majority of Eurovision songs are sung in English, to appeal to a wider audience.

ABBA perform Waterloo at the Eurovision Song Contest - image courtesy BBC

The UK gave ABBA nil points

In 1974, ABBA shot to international stardom after they won Eurovision with their hit song Waterloo. Embarrassingly, the UK gave ABBA nil points for their Eurovision entry. Luckily, the band didn’t let the UK’s faux pas stop them from becoming one of the best-selling music acts of all time.