North Macedonia in the Eurovision Song Contest

North Macedonia^[a] has participated in the Eurovision Song Contest 21 times since its official debut in 1998. The country had attempted to participate in 1996, but failed to qualify from the audio-only qualifying round. The Macedonian participant broadcaster in the contest is the Macedonian Radio Television (MRT).

North Macedonia in the Eurovision Song Contest
Participating broadcaster	Macedonian Radio Television (MRT)
Participation summary
Appearances	21 (9 finals)
First appearance	1998
Last appearance	2022
Highest placement	7th: 2019
Participation history 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 – 2025
Related articles
Skopje Fest
External links
North Macedonia's page at Eurovision.tv
For the most recent participation see North Macedonia in the Eurovision Song Contest 2022

Prior to 2019, North Macedonia's best result was a twelfth place finish with "Ninanajna" performed by Elena Risteska in 2006. Having qualified from the semi-final round only once in ten of the previous eleven contests (2008–18), North Macedonia achieved its best result to date in 2019, when "Proud" by Tamara Todevska qualified and finished in seventh place in the final after winning the jury vote. Following a further two non-qualifications, MRT withdrew from the 2023 contest in Liverpool and North Macedonia is yet to return.

Participation

The Macedonian Radio Television (MRT) is a full member of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) since 1 January 1993, thus eligible to participate in the Eurovision Song Contest since then. It has participated in the contest representing North Macedonia^[a] since its 43rd edition in 1998.

Before the country's independence in 1991 from SFR Yugoslavia, RTV Skopje –Yugoslav Radio Television's (JRT) affiliate in SR Macedonia, and MRT's predecessor– participated in the Yugoslav pre-selection called among the JRT affiliates from the other Yugoslav federal units.^[1] Also, Macedonian composers wrote songs for candidates from other parts of Yugoslavia.^[2] However, the only Macedonian win in the Yugoslav competition, "Vraćam se" by Maja Odžaklievska in 1980,^[1] did not compete in the Eurovision Song Contest 1980 due to JRT's decision not to participate that year. SR Macedonia was the only Yugoslav federal state that never sent a Yugoslav entry to the Eurovision Song Contest.

History

Tamara Todevska became the highest scoring Macedonian entrant in the contest with the song "Proud", which finished in seventh position at the 2019 contest, winning the jury vote.

MRT submitted its first entry, "Samo ti" (Само ти) sung by Kaliopi, for the 1996 contest. However, the country failed to qualify through the non-broadcast pre-selection round. Its efforts to enter the contest were again hindered in 1997, when another new system was introduced where countries with the lowest average scores over the previous four years were excluded from participating. The country made its debut in 1998, with "Ne zori, zoro" by Vlado Janevski.

The country's best result before 2019 (and the best result with its old name) was in 2006, with "Ninanajna" (Нинанајна) by Elena Risteska in Athens, who came 12th. It is the only country to have qualified from every semi-final from 2004 to 2007 (other countries have qualified for every final but due to them finishing in the top 10 the previous year, they did not have to compete in the semi-final). Despite never finishing in the top 10, their record of qualifying for every final was broken in 2008, when the jury vote used in the semi-final chose Sweden as a finalist, despite Tamara, Vrčak and Adrian having come 10th in the televote.

MRT has intermittently used the Skopje Fest to select the national entry since the country's debut, although it made several changes in the national final format, so the 2004, 2005, and 2006 national finals were organised outside the Skopje Fest.

For 2019, the country competed for the first time under the name North Macedonia.^[3] MRT selected "Proud" by Tamara Todevska as their act of choice. The song managed to qualify through the second semi-final, and reached seventh place in the final, winning the jury vote. This is the first top ten placing as well as the highest placing ever for North Macedonia in the history of the contest.

Following two non-qualifications in 2021 and 2022, MRT confirmed its absence in the 2023 contest, citing financial constraints.^[4] However, MRT still broadcast the 2023 contest with a view to return in 2024.^[5] The broadcaster's intention to return was stated in a budget plan published in September 2023.^[6][7] However, in late October 2023, the programme planning chair of MRT, Smilka Janeska Sarkanjac, clarified that a decision was yet to be made and the plan was still awaiting the approval of the government.^[8] North Macedonia ultimately did not appear on the final list of participants.^[9]

Participation overview

For contestants prior to 1996, see Yugoslavia in the Eurovision Song Contest.

Table key

2	Second place
X	Entry selected but did not compete

Year	Artist	Song	Language	Final	Points	Semi	Points
1996	Kaliopi	"Samo ti" (Само ти)	Macedonian	Failed to qualify[b] X		26	14
1998	Vlado Janevski	"Ne zori, zoro" (Не зори, зоро)	Macedonian	19	16	No semi-finals
2000	XXL	"100% te ljubam" (100% те љубам)	Macedonian, English	15	29
2002	Karolina	"Od nas zavisi" (Од нас зависи)	Macedonian	19	25
2004	Toše Proeski	"Life"	English	14	47	10	71
2005	Martin Vučić	"Make My Day"	English	17	52	9	97
2006	Elena Risteska	"Ninanajna" (Нинанајна)	English, Macedonian	12	56	10	76
2007	Karolina	"Mojot svet" (Мојот свет)	Macedonian, English	14	73	9	97
2008	Tamara, Vrčak and Adrijan	"Let Me Love You"	English	Failed to qualify		10[c]	64
2009	Next Time	"Nešto što kje ostane" (Нешто што ќе остане)	Macedonian			10[c]	45
2010	Gjoko Taneski	"Jas ja imam silata" (Јас ја имам силата)	Macedonian			15	37
2011	Vlatko Ilievski	"Rusinka" (Русинкa)	Macedonian, English			16	36
2012	Kaliopi	"Crno i belo" (Црно и бело)	Macedonian	13	71	9	53
2013	Esma and Lozano	"Pred da se razdeni" (Пред да се раздени)	Macedonian, Romani	Failed to qualify		16	28
2014	Tijana	"To the Sky"	English			13	33
2015	Daniel Kajmakoski	"Autumn Leaves"	English			15	28
2016	Kaliopi	"Dona" (Дона)	Macedonian			11	88
2017	Jana Burčeska	"Dance Alone"	English			15	69
2018	Eye Cue	"Lost and Found"	English			18	24
2019	Tamara Todevska	"Proud"	English	7	305	2	239
2020	Vasil	"You"	English	Contest cancelled[d] X
2021	Vasil	"Here I Stand"	English	Failed to qualify		15	23
2022	Andrea	"Circles"	English			11	76

Awards

Barbara Dex Award

Further information: Barbara Dex Award

Year	Performer	Host city	Ref.
2005	Martin Vučić	Kyiv	[10]
2018	Eye Cue	Lisbon	[11]

Related involvement

Delegation members

Each participating broadcaster in the Eurovision Song Contest assigns a head of delegation as the EBU's contact person and the leader of their delegation at the event. The delegation, whose size can greatly vary, includes a head of press, the performers, songwriters, composers, and backing vocalists, among others.^[12]

Heads of delegation

Year	Head of delegation	Ref.
2005	Ivan Mircevski	[13]
2012–2021	Meri Popova	[14][15][16]

Heads of press

Year	Head of press	Ref.
2019	Toni Cifrovski	[17]

Commentators and spokespersons

For the show's broadcast on MRT, various commentators have provided commentary on the contest in the Macedonian language. At the Eurovision Song Contest after all points are calculated, the presenters of the show call upon each voting country to invite each respective spokesperson to announce the results of their vote on-screen.^[18]

From 1961 until 1991, SR Macedonia was part of Yugoslavia and JRT's affiliate RTV Skopje broadcast the contest there with Macedonian commentary.

Year	Channel	Commentator(s)	Spokesperson	Ref.
1998	MTV	Unknown	Evgenija Teodosievska	[19]
1999			Did not participate	[20]
2000			Sandra Todorovska	[21]
2001			Did not participate	[22]
2002			Biljana Debarlieva	[23]
2003			Did not participate	[24]
2004			Karolina Petkovska	[25]
2005			Karolina Gočeva	[26]
2006		Karolina Petkovska	Martin Vučić	[27][28][29]
2007	MTV 1 (all shows)	Unknown	Elena Risteska	[30]
2008	MRT (all shows)		Ognen Janeski	[31]
2009		Karolina Petkovska and Aleksandra Jovanovska	Frosina Josifovska	[28][32]
2010		Karolina Petkovska	Milica Roštikjl	[28][32]
2011	MTV 1 (all shows)	Eli Tanaskovska	Kristina Talevska	[33]
2012	MRT 1 (all shows)	Karolina Petkovska		[34][28][35]
2013			Dimitar Atanasovski	[36][28][37]
2014	MRT 1, MRT SAT, Radio Skopje (all shows)		Marko Mark	[28][38][39][40][41]
2015	MRT 1, MRT SAT, Radio Skopje, MRT 2, MRT 2 SAT (all shows)			[42][28][43]
2016	MRT 1 (all shows)		Dijana Gogova	[44][28][45]
2017			Ilija Grujoski	[28][46][47]
2018	MRT 1, MRT 2, Radio Skopje (all shows)		Jana Burčeska	[28][48][49]
2019	MRT 1 (all shows)	Toni Cifrovski	Nikola Trajkovski	[17][50]
2020	Not announced before cancellation			N/A
2021	MRT 1, MRT 2 (all shows)	Eli Tanaskovska	Vane Markoski	[51][52][53]
2022			Jana Burčeska	[54][55][56]
2023	MRT 1, MRT 2, Radio Skopje (all shows)	Aleksandra Jovanovska and Eli Tanaskovska	Did not participate	[57][58][59]
2024	MRT 1, Radio Skopje (all shows)	Aleksandra Jovanovska		[60]
2025	TBA			[61]

Other shows

Show	Commentator	Channel	Ref.
Eurovision: Europe Shine a Light	Aleksandra Jovanovska	MRT 1	[62]

Photo gallery

• 
  Toše Proeski in Istanbul (2004)
• 
  Karolina Gočeva in Helsinki (2007)
• 
  Tamara, Vrčak and Adrian in Belgrade (2008)
• 
  Next Time in Moscow (2009)
• 
  Vlatko Ilievski in Düsseldorf (2011)
• 
  Esma Redžepova and Vlatko Lozanoski in Malmö (2013)
• 
  Tijana in Copenhagen (2014)
• 
  Daniel Kajmakoski in Vienna (2015)
• 
  Kaliopi in Stockholm (2016)
• 
  Jana Burčeska in Kyiv (2017)
• 
  Eye Cue in Lisbon (2018)
• 
  Tamara Todevska in Tel Aviv (2019)
• 
  Vasil in Rotterdam (2021)
• 
  Andrea in Turin (2022)

See also

• North Macedonia in the Junior Eurovision Song Contest

Notes and references

Notes

1. Presented until 2018 as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (F.Y.R. Macedonia).
2. In order to reduce the number of participating countries at the 1996 event a qualifying round was held among all countries except the hosts. Macedonia failed to progress from this round; entries which failed to progress have subsequently been discounted by the EBU and do not feature as part of the countries' list of appearances.
3. In 2008 and 2009 the top nine countries in each semi-final as determined by televoting qualified automatically, with the tenth place determined based on the votes of the back-up juries among the remaining countries. This resulted in Sweden and Finland advancing to the final instead of Macedonia in 2008 and 2009 respectively.
4. The 2020 contest was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

References

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External links

• Eurovision North Macedonia