We are likely days away from finding out one of the last big pieces of the Eurovision puzzle. Now that all 37 songs have been presented to the EBU, the producers have been able to begin putting together the running order for the two Semi Finals – a job that is much more important than it might seem.

This will be the second Eurovision Song Contest where only the public vote will determine which countries make it out of the Semi Finals to perform again on Saturday night. So we took the juries out of the equation and looked back at only where countries finished based solely on the televote.

Another important year to this story is 2013, also in Malmö. That year, host broadcaster SVT’s producers made the running order themselves for the first time, instead of drawing lots, as had been done previously, in an effort to make the best show possible by separating songs that sounded or looked too similar.

Many variables can affect the data. For instance, the number of performing countries, which this year will be 15 and 16 in Semi Finals 1 and 2 respectively.

Furthermore, we do not yet know what impact the rest of the world vote being open for 24 hours and the televote opening at the start of the show, will have on the final list of qualifiers. With all that in mind, some trends did emerge from the data:

• Perfoming 2nd in the running order really is a curse. The average result is an abysmal 13.0 place, while only three songs have ever finished Top 10 with the televote from that spot. The lucky three to beat the odds were: 🇦🇲 Face the Shadow by Genealogy in 2015 (6th), 🇵🇱 Color of Your Life by Michał Szpak in 2016 (4th), and 🇦🇲 Future Lover by Brunette (6th).
• No matter what way you slice it, performing in the second half is a big advantage. For the purposes of 2024, Semi Final 1 breaks down like this: 1st half average (songs 1-7) 10.2 place, 2nd half average (songs 8-15) 8.5 place. Semi Final 2 has very similar numbers: 1st half average (songs 1-8) 10.1 place, 2nd half average (songs 9-16) 8.3 place.
• By a wide margin, closing the show is a blessing. Only twice has the final song in a Semi not made the Top 10 of the televote (🇷🇸 Ljubav je svuda by Moje 3 in 2013 and 🇱🇻 Line by Triana Park in 2017 are the unlucky two songs).
• The average for the last song is a 4.5 place, whereas the next best spot in the running order is a 6.0 place for the 9th song in the running order.
• Furthermore, the closer a song is to the end of the show, the better it has done on average. Since 2013, songs performing in 15th in the running order have averaged a 7.6 place finish, 16th in the RO averaged a 7.5 place, 17th in the RO averaged a 7.2 place, and 18th in the RO averaged a 6.4 place final result.

Interestingly, only one of the twenty Semis since 2013 has had enough songs competing that a song got to perform in 19th place. That happened in Lisbon 2018 when 🇨🇾 Fuego by Eleni Foureira won the televote in her Semi!

When it comes to determining when we will find out the official running order, that’s just as tough to predict. The EBU has no fixed date when they must reveal the RO, but since 2013, every reveal has come in the same 3-week window at the end of March and early April.

Until then, you can check out our predcitions for what this year’s running order might look like:

What are your thoughts about the running order? Let us know in the comments and on our social media profiles @buildingbridgespod!

Photo: EBU/Anna Velikova