Eurovision 2023: Ticketmaster ‘crashes’ as people try to buy tickets for Liverpool shows -but they’re sold out

Fans of global singing competition the Eurovision song contest have been left frustrated after Ticketmaster appeared to crash while they were trying to secure tickets. Tickets to the shows, which take place in Liverpool in May, went on sale at 12pm UK time - and thousands of people immediately went on to the website to try to get themselves tickets for seats.

However, people were quickly left disappointed as the webpage showed an error message. Others, who were trying to create an account on the Ticketmaster website to join the queue for tickets found that they were unable to do so. Ticketmaster, however, has denied that the site crashed and said that a “very small number of fans” had issues accessing the online queue. Tickets to all the shows have now been sold out - something which happened within 90 minutes of tickets going on sale, according to the BBC.

Irritated music fans took to Twitter to express their annoyance. One person sarcastically quipped that it would be far easier to actually take part in the contest rather than try to buy tickets. They said: “Even though I know nothing about music composition, I’ve realised it’d be easier to write a song, get selected for the national final, win that, then win through the semi-final to get into the Grand Final, then buy tickets via Ticketmaster #Eurovision.”

Another person said they thought the tickets should have been allocated to people through a ballot because they found that the website crashed when they attempted to make a purchase. They said: “Tried & failed to buy @Eurovision tickets. Whole @TicketmasterUK scenario a disaster, Website crashes, queues endless, then when it was my turn it crashed & back to beginning only to find all tickets now sold This should have been Balloted to be fair SO disappointed.”

A Ticketmaster spokesperson said: “The Ticketmaster site did not crash today – rather a very small number of fans experienced issues accessing the queue. Ticket sales were unaffected, and thousands of fans secured their seats for the Eurovision Song Contest, which is now sold out.”

Nine Eurovision shows will take place at Liverpool’s M&S Bank Arena between 8 and 13 May, including two semi finals and the grand final. The UK was chosen as the host for this year’s competition on behalf of 2022 winners Ukraine. This is because organisers decided Ukraine could not host due to the ongoing conflict with Russia, and the UK came second place in last year’s contest with singer Sam Ryder. Liverpool was chosen as the specific host city in October.

A BBC Spokesperson said: “As expected demand for Eurovision Song Contest tickets was extremely high and tickets for all nine shows sold out in 90 minutes. Congratulations to those who secured their seats to Liverpool Arena in May. We are now looking forward to putting on a brilliant show for our global TV audience and those watching on BBC One and BBC iPlayer in the UK.”