NATIONAL SELECTIONS. For three weeks, the song submission for the Swedish Eurovision 2025 selection Melodifestivalen is open for everyone who is interested to take the chance to send in songs which could be the next Swedish song competing in Switzerland next spring.
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You can find the song submission on this external platform where it will be open until September 13 at 11:59 AM, CEST (local time in Sweden). Until then, you and your team are allowed to send in as many songs you want, however they all need to comply with the rules which you can find in our FAQ further down in this article.
When the submission has closed, a jury will listen to the submitted songs and choose 15 which they think are the best ones for the competition. When the jury’s job is finished, the Melodifestivalen editorial staff at Swedish Television (SVT) will select another 15 songs, which can both be songs that the jury didn’t choose as well as other so called specially ordered songs from specific song writers or artists. During the late autumn, i.e., November or December, SVT is planning to reveal the participating songs and artists.
How the Melodifestivalen 2025 will work
A total of 30 songs will compete in Melodifestivalen 2025. They will be divided into five shows with six songs each. In each show, the two songs which gets the most votes and/or the highest scores will advance directly to the final, while the song which gets the third place will after the five showes compete in a separate show called ’Final qualification’ against all the four other third-place entries for the remaining two spots in the final. After the five shows and the Final qualification-round, a total of 12 songs will join the Grand Final line-up where the winner, i.e., Sweden’s next Eurovision representative and song, will be selected.
New rules
There are some new rules in the rules and regulations, one of these is that the fourth placed songs in the heats will no longer be a part of the final qualification round, i.e., only the five third placed songs will have another ‘last chance’ to reach the final. This will be decided in two rounds: the first winner be selected based on which of the five received the most votes in their heat, and the second winner will be selected based on a new voting round which will be added to the heat votes, i.e., the song with the most votes after both rounds will be the 12th finalist!
Another rule change is that SVT has decided to re-write the rules regarding when the participating songs will be published for the public. Until last year, the songs were performed in the live broadcast before they were released to the public, with exception for the finalists which were not released after the show, they were only released after all heats had been broadcasted. However, in 2025, SVT will release the weekly line-up studio versions one day before the live broadcasting. This means that regardless of qualification, you are allowed to listen to all the six songs in that heat even after the broadcasting.
FAQ Melodifestivalen 2025
Here is our summary of the most important rules. However, we recommend everyone who wants to send songs to Melodifestivalen to always read the the rules and regulations (NB they are only in Swedish) before submitting any songs.
Who are eligible to submit entries?
Anyone is allowed to send in as many songs as they want to do, if the songs, artist and the song writers complies with the regulations. However, there are some exceptions here, example if you are hired at or work for Sveriges Television between August 1, 2024, and March 30, 2025, then you are not allowed to compete in the contest.
A song writing team can consists of as many or few persons as you like and from any countries in the world, however, as long as one of you either is a Swedish citizen and/or having a Swedish citizenship. At least one of these things was fixed at the latest of August 13, 2024. This rule, however, only applies to song writers and not singers.
One of SVT’s ambition is that at least one half of the line-up shall consist of songs who are either totally or partly written and/or composed by female songwriters. This is a policy or an encouragement to all the songwriters (and not a rule).
Everyone who takes part in the contest must approve the marketing policy SVT and Melodifestivalen have.
What are the requirements for the entries?
For an entry to be approved to the competition, it must meet all the following four requirements.
The entry must be a completely newly written song who’s never has been public to the public.
This requirement means that you as songwriter must own your song and if the song is selected to take part, then you are not allowed to publish it (or that it could have been published before) on any platform, whether digital or analog, before SVT says it is okay to publish the song. Examples of such platforms include concerts, social media, and music streaming platforms. Additionally, the EBU requires that an entry who wants to compete in the Eurovision Song Contest 2025 has never been published on any platforms before September 1, 2024.
However, if an entry is released on a public platform, accidentally or not, before the deadline set by SVT, then SVT will investigate the matter thoroughly, including the intent behind the release. SVT does not disqualify entries arbitrarily if there was no intent to violate the rules.
The entry must fit the three-minute time frame.
However, demo songs can be both shorter as well as longer than that, though they cannot be shorter than two minutes.
The entry must have a lyric.
How much of the three minutes the song need a lyric is, however, up to one’s own interpretation.
Some words and expression are forbidden to be used in the lyrics
According to the EBU’s regulations for the Eurovision Song Contest, no commercial, religious and political words and expressions are allowed in the songs. SVT, however, accepting swearing in the lyrics even though those kinds of words could be removed if the song is winning Melodifestivalen 2025 and will get the honor represent Sweden at the Eurovision 2025.
Can anyone compete as an artist in Melodifestivalen?
If the singer is born before May 2009, then the singer is, technically speaking, allowed to take part as an artist in the competition in 2025. However, it is SVT who decide all artists to the songs, and even if the demo singers may be the singer for the song (if the song is selected to take part) the person or group is not self-written for the situation.
As mentioned earlier in the FAQ, the singer is not needed to be a Swedish citizen and/or having a Swedish citizenship.
How many is allowed on stage during each song’s performance?
Unlike the Eurovision Song Contest, SVT has so called extended rules for the stage performances. One of those is that SVT allowing as many as eight people for each stage performance. In the Eurovision, a maximum of six people is allowed at the same time. This means that if the winning song has more than six people on stage at the same time (technical staff not included) the performance is needed to be re-arranged before Eurovision takes place.
Another rule SVT has is that they allow pre-recorded choirs, as well as a live-played instrument. In Eurovision, all instruments on stage will only be used as props, i.e., the music is pre-recorded.
Can the artist sing the song in any language(s)?
Yes, there is no language barriers in the contest, and you can also submit the song in more than one version if you like. However, SVT decides which language(s) each song will be performed in, which also applies for what language the song will be sung in the Eurovision Song Contest next year.
Approximately one third of the line-up will consists of songs who will be sung in Swedish. However, how many songs it will be is not more officially presented than that.
Other important rules for you to know about
As a summary, we recommend you reading the the rules and regulations before submitting any songs for Melodifestivalen 2025. This applies especially to section B7 to B18 and C1 to C4, which is regarding copyright and other terms, things that we have not mentioned here. You should also be aware that SVT owns the rules for the Melodifestivalen contest, which means they have the right to add, change and remove things in the rules as well as they have the rights to disqualify anyone (singer, songwriter and songs) who break the rules.
Another important thing to remember is that until the jury and SVT have selected all the 30 songs and artists, they are allowed to block every submitted song for to be released on public platforms. This applies at least until November 25, 2024. If your song wasn’t selected, then you are allowed to do what you want to do with that song, however, if you want to try submitting it another year, a recommendation is to not make the song public to the public.
