Serbia’s PzE kicks off: seven qualifiers, zero mercy, and Vienna in sight
Pesma za Evroviziju is back, which means Serbia has once again decided the most sensible way to pick a Eurovision entry is to throw twelve songs into a televised pressure cooker, add a jury and a public vote, and watch everyone age three years in one evening. The mission is simple: find a successor to Princ, and try to do what every Balkan delegation dreams of doing in May, namely qualify and cause a little bit of trouble on the scoreboard.
Semi-Final 1 aired on 24 February, hosted by Dragana Kosjerina and Kristina Radenković, with Stefan Popović hovering in the green room to capture every smile, every grimace, and every “I’m fine, I’m fine” lie. Twelve acts performed, and seven earned their place in the Grand Final on Saturday 28 February.
Running order
MIRNA – “OMAJA”
Kosmos trip – “Sve je u redu”
Iva Grujin – “Otkrivam sebe”
Eegor – “Klaber”
Makao – “Daj nam svet”
Lores – “Unseen”
MANIVI – “Svaki dan”
Bella – “Trampolina”
YANX – “Srušio si sve”
Zejna – “Jugoslavija”
Ana Mašulović – “Zavoli me”
Đurđica – “Moma mala”
How the night worked
PzE does not mess about with complicated gimmicks. It’s the classic jury + televote combination, and the only thing you can really control is whether your three minutes land like a punchline or a punch. When the voting closed, the first half of Saturday’s line-up was set: seven qualifiers, five heartbreaks, and a second semi-final still to come before we know the full fourteen-act Grand Final roster.
Results
The seven qualifiers (jury + televote) were:
Lores – “Unseen”
Zejna – “Jugoslavija”
YANX – “Srušio si sve”
Ana Mašulović – “Zavoli me”
Kosmos trip – “Sve je u redu”
MIRNA – “OMAJA”
Iva Grujin – “Otkrivam sebe”
What it means for Saturday
These seven now get to do the fun part: wait through Semi-Final 2, watch another batch qualify, and then spend Saturday pretending they’re calm about competing in a final that decides who goes to Vienna 2026. And if you’re Serbia, there’s always that extra layer: you’re not just choosing a song, you’re choosing the whole package, the vibe, the staging, the story, and the one performance that has to survive the Eurovision semi-final jungle.
For now, Semi-Final 1 has done its job. It’s given us a clean set of qualifiers, a tidy running order, and enough variety to make the final feel like it could genuinely swing in a few different directions, depending on what Thursday adds to the mix. Saturday, as ever, will be brutal.
