Tourism Ministry "does not contemplate" reducing its support for the Benidorm Fest and dismisses the possibility of a venue change

The continuation of the Benidorm Fest in the city that gives it its name remains unconfirmed officially. Both the city council of the Costa Blanca's tourist capital and Radio Television Española (RTVE) expressed their intention to maintain the venue during the press conference preceding the start of the fourth edition of the music contest last Monday, but the agreement linking the Fest and Benidorm has not yet been signed.

In the background of the negotiations, as always, lies the economic aspect, which is where the main (and only) doubts arose. In the absence of representatives from the Consell at the event, there was speculation that the Generalitat Valenciana might be considering what to do with the budget allocation for a music contest that, on the other hand, has become one of the cornerstones of Benidorm's tourism off-season strategy.

The Generalitat Valenciana will have to face multi-million euro investments in the coming years to ensure the reconstruction of areas affected by the DANA, and to balance the books, it is assumed that cuts will have to be made in other areas, including, it was speculated, the Benidorm Fest.

However, according to sources from the Ministry of Tourism of the Valencian Community, "the commitment to the Benidorm Fest remains." The department led by Marian Cano categorically denies that the regional contribution to the festival, for which "this year we have just contributed one and a half million euros," is in jeopardy for future editions.

In fact, the same sources have stated that "as we have demonstrated so far, the commitment remains and we have not contemplated anything different," so, at least in that sense, it seems that the intention of all parties involved, namely RTVE (owner of the format), the city council (host of the contest), and the Generalitat (original promoter of the idea), is to keep everything unchanged in the near future.

Beyond intentions, the truth is that, as with any major event, the commitment and expenditure of public money can only be justified based on the success of the initiative, and in that sense, the 2025 Benidorm Fest has shown not only that it is not losing momentum but continues to gain new followers, at least in terms of television viewership.

In fact, according to data released by RTVE yesterday, the first of the two semi-finals (the second will be held tonight) was the most-watched program on Tuesday and the most-followed opening gala in the four-year history of the contest.

Moreover, in addition to linear TV viewers, the first gala on RTVE Play was watched live by more than 100,000 unique visitors and recorded 189,000 views, making it the most-watched Benidorm Fest semi-final in the platform's history, growing by 55% compared to last year.

RTVE's social media surpassed 2.6 million views and 80,000 interactions, with a 53% increase in impact compared to the first semi-final of 2024. The Benidorm Fest was the number one worldwide trending topic last night with over 46.7 thousand posts and 16.7 million impressions on tweets by users.

The big data analysis conducted by Visit Benidorm indicates that the hashtags #benidormfestSemi1, #benidormfest2025, and #benidormfest reached the top spot among national and international trends, with users from up to 69 countries following the event through this channel.