Sweden in the Eurovision Song Contest

Richard and Per Herrey of Herreys (1984), Carola Häggkvist (1991), Måns Zelmerlöw (2015), Loreen (2012) and Björn Ulvaeus of ABBA (1974)

Sweden's first entrant in the contest was Alice Babs in 1958, who was placed fourth. This remained the country's best result until 1966, when Lill Lindfors and Svante Thuresson were second.

Sweden's first Eurovision victory was in 1974 with the song "Waterloo", performed by ABBA. Thanks to their victory in Brighton, ABBA went on to gain worldwide success and become one of the best-selling pop groups of all time. In the 1980s, Sweden achieved three successive top three results. After Carola finished third in 1983, the Herreys gave Sweden its second victory in 1984 with "Diggi-Loo Diggi-Ley". Kikki Danielsson then finished third in 1985. Carola returned to the contest in 1991, to give the Swedes their third win with "Fångad av en stormvind", defeating France in a tie-break. Charlotte Nilsson gave the country a second win of the decade in 1999, with "Take Me to Your Heaven". The 1990s also saw two third-place results, for Jan Johansen in 1995 and One More Time in 1996. In the 2000s, the best Swedish result was fifth place, which they achieved four times, with Friends in 2001, Fame in 2003, Lena Philipsson in 2004 and Carola, who in 2006, became the only Swedish performer to achieve three top five results. Together with Croatia and Malta, Sweden was one of only three countries never to have been relegated under the pre 2004 rules of the contest. Sweden was also the first country to win 3 semifinals.

In 2010, Anna Bergendahl became the first Swedish entrant to fail to make it to the final, finishing 11th in the semifinal, only five points from qualification (in 2008, Charlotte Perrelli finished 12th in the semifinal but qualified through the back-up jury selection). Since then, the country has been very successful, finishing in the top seven in all the editions except one. This includes victories for Loreen, who gave Sweden its fifth victory in 2012 with the song "Euphoria", making Sweden one of only two countries (along with the United Kingdom) to have Eurovision victories in four different decades, and for the sixth time with Måns Zelmerlöw's "Heroes" in 2015. Sweden is one of only two countries - along with Ukraine in 2004 and 2016 with Ruslana and Jamala respectively - to win twice since the introduction of the semi-finals in 2004, performing the feat in both 2012 and 2015 with 372 and 365 points respectively, making Sweden additionally the first country to have scored 300 points or more twice. They also finished third in 2011 with Eric Saade and "Popular", third in 2014 with Sanna Nielsen and "Undo", fifth with Frans and "If I Were Sorry" in 2016, fifth with Robin Bengtsson and "I Can't Go On" in 2017, and fifth with John Lundvik and "Too Late For Love" in 2019.

Melodifestivalen is an annual music competition organised by Swedish public broadcasters Sveriges Television (SVT) and Sveriges Radio (SR). It has chosen the country's representative for the Eurovision Song Contest since 1959. It is Sweden's most popular television shows, and it has been estimated that more than 4 million Swedes watch the show annually.

Almost every Swedish entry for Eurovision has been selected through Melodifestivalen. Only Sweden's first entry in 1958 was not selected through Melodifestivalen, having been selected internally by the Swedish broadcaster at the time, Swedish Radio Service.

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  Alice Babs in Hilversum (1958)
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  Ingvar Wixell in Naples (1965)
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  Tomas Ledin in The Hague (1980)
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  Carola Häggkvist in Athens (2006)
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  The Ark in Helsinki (2007)
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  Charlotte Perrelli in Belgrade (2008)
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  Malena Ernman in Moscow (2009)
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  Anna Bergendahl in Oslo (2010)
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  Eric Saade in Düsseldorf (2011)
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  Loreen in Baku (2012)
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  Robin Stjernberg in Malmö (2013)
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  Sanna Nielsen in Copenhagen (2014)
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  Måns Zelmerlöw in Vienna (2015)
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  Frans in Stockholm (2016)
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  Robin Bengtsson in Kyiv (2017)
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  Benjamin Ingrosso in Lisbon (2018)
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  John Lundvik in Tel Aviv (2019)

No restriction on the nationality of the songwriter(s) and the artist exists in the Eurovision Song Contest rules, which has resulted in countries being represented by songwriters and artist who are not nationals of that country. In recent years Swedish songwriters have been involved in the writing entirely or partly of entries from several countries apart from Sweden.

• In 2010, the songs from Belarus, Denmark, Georgia, Norway, Ireland and Azerbaijan were written entirely or partly by Swedes;
• In 2011, the songs from Russia and Azerbaijan;
• In 2012, the songs from Italy, United Kingdom, Ireland, Malta, Greece, Cyprus, Norway, Azerbaijan and Spain;
• In 2013, the songs from Georgia, Finland, Norway, Russia, Netherlands and Azerbaijan.
• In 2014, the songs from Azerbaijan, Ireland, Denmark, Russia, United Kingdom and Ukraine;
• In 2015, the songs from Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova, Macedonia, Netherlands, Spain and Russia.
• In 2016, the songs from Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Cyprus, Georgia, Lithuania, Norway, Malta, Moldova and Russia.
• In 2017, the songs from Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Macedonia, Poland, Greece, Ireland, Serbia and Switzerland.
• In 2018, the songs from Austria, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Denmark, Finland, Malta, and Poland.
• In 2019, the songs from Azerbaijan, Denmark, Estonia, Malta, Moldova, Cyprus, Switzerland, Norway, the Netherlands, and United Kingdom.
• In 2020, the songs from Denmark, France, Germany and Malta

• Melodifestivalen
• Sweden in the Junior Eurovision Song Contest – Junior version of the Eurovision Song Contest.
• Sweden in the Eurovision Dance Contest – Dance version of the Eurovision Song Contest.
• Sweden in the Eurovision Young Dancers – A competition organised by the EBU for younger dancers aged between 16 and 21.
• Sweden in the Eurovision Young Musicians – A competition organised by the EBU for musicians aged 18 years and younger.
• Sweden in the Turkvision Song Contest – A contest for countries and regions which are of Turkic-speaking or Turkic ethnicity.
• Sweden's voting at the Eurovision Song Contest

• SVT's site for Melodifestivalen
• Swedish Radio's site for Melodifestivalen
• Gylleneskor.se
• ESC Sweden
• OGAE Sweden, the Swedish branch of the ESC fan club
• Schlager Party, a London series of schlager events
• Schlager Radio
• Points to and from Sweden eurovisioncovers.co.uk