The Eurovision Song Contest is waltzing back to Vienna.
Custom dictates that the country of the contest’s winner hosts the next edition, so Austria was duly set as the location when JJ won Eurovision 2025 with ‘Wasted Love’.
The Austrian capital, Vienna, has been selected as the location for the upcoming 70th Eurovision Song Contest, which will take place on May 16 next year.
Historically, Vienna was home to Beethoven and scores of European composers, and come 2026, musicians and singers will perform their Eurovision numbers in the city’s Wiener Stadthalle, Austria’s largest indoor arena.
Vienna is familiar ground for Eurovision. It first hosted the Contest in 1967 after Udo Jürgens’ win with ‘Merci Chérie’ – and then again in 2015, following Conchita Wurst’s victory in 2014 with ‘Rise Like A Phoenix’.
As the event has grown in popularity and stature, the host cities now program a whole series of events in the run-up to the semi-finals and finals.
Austrian pubcaster ORF is the host broadcaster for the 2026 edition. Eurovision is organized by the European Broadcasting Union, the body representing Europe’s public service media.
“Vienna’s reputation as one of the most musical cities in the world, and its location in the heart of Europe, makes it the perfect Host City for the 70th Eurovision Song Contest,” said Martin Green CBE, Director of the Eurovision Song Contest. “Together with Host Broadcaster ORF and the city of Vienna we will create a spectacular celebration of music that will reverberate across the world.”
The EBU has bold plans for the expansion Eurovision including establishing versions in different parts of the world, as Green explained in an in-depth interview with Deadline ahead of this year’s edition in Basel, Switzerland.
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