Format

The selection of the competing entries for the national final and ultimately the Ukrainian Eurovision entry took place over three stages. In the first stage, artists and songwriters had the opportunity to apply for the competition through an online submission form. Sixteen acts were selected and announced on 9 January 2019. The second stage consisted of the televised semi-finals which took place on 9 and 16 February 2019 with eight acts competing in each show. Three acts were selected to advance from each semi-final based on the 50/50 combination of votes from a public televote and an expert jury. Both the public televote and the expert jury assigned scores ranging from 1 (lowest) to 8 (highest) and the three entries that had the highest number of points following the combination of these scores advanced to the final. The third stage was the final, which took place on 23 February 2019 and featured the six acts that qualified from the semi-finals vying to represent Ukraine in Tel Aviv. The winner was selected via the 50/50 combination of votes from a public televote and an expert jury. Both the public televote and the expert jury assigned scores ranging from 1 (lowest) to 6 (highest) and the entry that had the highest number of points following the combination of these scores was declared the winner. Viewers participating in the public televote during the three live shows had the opportunity to submit a single vote per phone number for each of the participating entries via SMS or the Teleportal mobile application. In the event of a tie during the semi-finals and final, the tie was decided in favour of the entry that received the highest score from the public televote.

The jury panel that voted during the three shows consisted of:

• Andriy Danylko – comedian and singer, represented Ukraine in 2007 as the drag artist Verka Serduchka
• Jamala – singer-songwriter, winner of the Eurovision Song Contest 2016 for Ukraine
• Yevhen Filatov (The Maneken) – singer and producer, creator of group Onuka

Competing entries

Artists and composers had the opportunity to submit their entries via an online submission form which accepted entries between 20 October 2018 and 25 December 2018. Composer and producer Ruslan Kvinta was assigned as the music producer of the show and was the lead in reviewing the 860 received submissions and shortlisting entries to compete in the national final. On 9 January 2019, the sixteen selected competing acts were announced. On 22 January 2019, it was announced that "Ochi", written by Tetiana Reshetniak and Vitaliy Telezin and to have been performed by Tayanna, was withdrawn from the competition and replaced by the song "Siren Song" performed by Maruv.^[5] The sixteen acts were allocated to one of two semi-finals during a draw that took place on 22 January, which was hosted by Ruslan Kvinta.^[6]

Shows

Semi-finals

The two semi-finals took place on 9 and 16 February 2019. In each semi-final eight acts competed and the top three entries determined following the combination of votes from a public televote and an expert jury advanced to the final of the competition, while the remaining five entries were eliminated. In addition to the performances of the competing entries, 2018 Ukrainian Eurovision entrant Mélovin performed the song "Z toboyu, zi mnoyu, i hodi" as a guest in the first semi-final, while 2019 Czech Eurovision entrant Lake Malawi performed the 2019 Czech entry "Friend of a Friend" as a guest in the second semi-final.

Final

The final took place on 23 February 2019. The six entries that qualified from the semi-finals competed. The winner, "Siren Song" performed by Maruv, was selected through the combination of votes from a public televote and an expert jury. Ties were decided in favour of the entries that received higher scores from the public televote. In addition to the performances of the competing entries, guests included jury member Jamala performing the song "Solo", and 2019 French Eurovision entrant Bilal Hassani performing the 2019 French entry "Roi".