Against the hopes and expectations of many in Finland, its act Lampenius x Parkkonen did not win this year's Eurovision Song Contest.
Instead, the victory went to Bulgaria's singer Dara, with the energetic, danceable track Bangaranga.
Finland came in sixth, not first as many international bookmakers had anticipated.
The violinist-vocalist duo qualified for the final with their entry "Liekinheitin" ("Flamethrower") earlier this week and saw their odds of winning further increasing. However, Finland did not manage to make those expectations a reality.
You can watch Lampenius and Parkkonen's performance of Liekinheitin at the final here:
There is a photo gallery of the contest's highlights here (page in Finnish).
While many of the duo's supporters were unhappy about the results, Lampenius and Parkkonen said they were not disappointed.
"It feels absolutely fantastic. We gave such a performance tonight that it simply couldn't have gone better. It was not only technically perfect, but also filled with emotion. We really gave it our all," the violinist Lampenus said at the press room after the results came in.
"I haven't shed a tear. Just today alone our song has been streamed a million times, so it's impossible not to be happy," she added.
"Winning is not the most important thing, but the journey we have been on," vocalist Parkkonen noted.
After the contest, Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo (NCP) invited Lampenius and Parkkonen to the PM's official residence Kesäranta, saying they had made Finland proud.
In honour of the duo's song, Orpo shared a social media post showing himself using a flamethrower, which he posted ahead of the final, wishing them luck. The PM also shared a video of the flamethrowing moment on Instagram.
"You made all of Finland proud and are the real winners of our hearts," Orpo's post on Facebook read.
Broadcast reached 2.6m in Finland
An average of 1.8 million people in Finland watched the Eurovision Song Contest on Saturday night, according to Finnpanel's viewer data.
The four-hour broadcast, which started at 10pm Finnish time, reached a total of more than 2.6 million viewers over the course of the evening.
Lampenius and Parkkonen's performance during last week's semi-final was seen by more than 900,000 viewers in Finland, while the entire qualifier reached 1.8 million people. Yle's platform Areena's stream of the semi-final was started approximately 230,000 times.
Edited at 12:21pm on 17 May 2026 to add viewer numbers.
