Five heats were held in the Swedish cities of Örnsköldsvik, Sandviken, Gothenburg and Malmö, with Örebro hosting the final Andra Chansen (Second Chance) round.

The final consisted of 10 songs, who are awarded marks by 11 regional juries of Sweden, alongside televoting, with each comprising 50% of the total result.

[7][8] This year's contest was hosted by a trio: comedian Christine Meltzer, three-time Melodifestivalen participant and Eurovision winner in 2015 in Vienna, Måns Zelmerlöw, and actor Dolph Lundgren.

As since 2004 SVT has specially invited four artists and composers to compete in Melodifestivalen, in order to diversify the musical qualify of the contest.

As well as this the 2010 contest introduced a "web wildcard" competition, in which songwriters who were not linked to any record companies could publish compositions over two weeks in September and October 2009 on SVT Melodifestivalen website.

Soul singer Pauline Kamusewu would compete in the second semifinal of Melodifestivalen with the song "Sucker for Love", written by herself and Fredrik "Fredro" Ödesjö, Andreas Levander and Johan "Jones" Wetterberg.

This allowed new promising talents a new way to enter Melodifestivalen instead of through the regular public submission process, in which amateur musicians rarely succeeded.

The winner was announced on 12 November at 8:45 am on SVT's morning news programme Gomorron Sverige, with the duo MiSt (Mia Terngård & Stefan Lebert) winning the contest with the song was "Come and Get Me Now".

[32][33] The song was replaced on 20 October 2009 by "You're Making Me Hot-Hot-Hot", written by Tobias Lundgren, Johan Fransson and Tim Larsson.

[44] The first heat began with a performance by former Melodifestivalen contestants Charlotte Perrelli, Nanne Grönvall and Sonja Aldén of the Bonnie Tyler song "Holding Out for a Hero".

Ola, dressed in casual clothes, was joined by a pianist, and gave a simple performance with effective use of light movement, and later using pyrotechnics.

Silver was dressed in a golden corset and a single steel glove on her left arm, and performed alone on stage to flashing lights in the background.

[45][46][47] The fifth act to take the stage in Örnsköldsvik was Anders Ekborg and "The Saviour", with an operatic and theatrical beginning, later turning more rock-ish.

Jessica Andersson, who represented Sweden at the Eurovision Song Contest 2003 as a member of Fame next took the stage with "I Did It for Love", a strong ballad.

Andersson performed alone on stage in a navy dress, and the song builds to a large climax during the choruses, before ending slowly.

[48][49] Ola Svensson, Linda Pritchard, Pain of Salvation and Jessica Andersson competed again in the second round of televoting for the final places.

At the end of the televoting Ola Svensson was selected to progress to the final, while Pain of Salvation and Jessica Andersson qualified to the Andra Chansen round.

[53] The first act on stage in Sandviken was Eric Saade with his song "Manboy", written by two-time Melodifestivalen winning songwriter Fredrik Kempe, and Peter Boström.

Anna-Maria Espinosa followed on stage, performing the dramatic Swedish ballad "Innan alla ljusen brunnit ut" (Before all the candles had burnt out).

The fourth act on stage was web wildcard winner MiSt, now joined by dansband Highlights, performing "Come and Get Me Now", now in a typical dansband style, with Highlights taking lead vocals and MiSt band-members Mia Terngård and Stefan Lebert taking backing vocals.

The penultimate act on stage was Kalle Moraeus & Orsa Spelmän with the song "Underbart" (Wonderful), a gentle folk ballad and the third entry in the second heat sung in Swedish, with the band and backing singers dressed in black.

[57][58] Pauline, Andreas Johnson, Kalle Moraeus & Orsa Spelmän and Hanna Lindblad continued to fight for advancement in the competition, and after a second round of televoting Andreas Johnson was selected to progress to the final, while Pauline and Kalle Moraeus & Orsa Spelmän qualified to the Andra Chansen round.

[61] After the eight performances and the first round of voting, Johannes Bah Kuhnke, Elin Lanto and Getty were eliminated from the contest, while Timoteij progressed direct to the final in Globen, leaving Alcazar, Erik Linder, Darin and Crucified Barbara to fight for the remaining places.

One-minute clips were released by SVT on Monday 22 February, four days earlier than planned, after two of the eight songs were leaked on a Yahoo!

[67] After the first round of televoting concluded after the eight performances, Py Bäckman, Sibel and Lovestoned were eliminated from the competition, coming 8th, 7th and 6th in the voting respectively.

[68][69][70] NEO, Pernilla Wahlgren, Noll disciplin and Peter Jöback fought for the remaining places in the final and Andra Chansen rounds.

In the first duel Pain of Salvation was defeated by Pernilla Wahlgren, and Crucified Barbara won against Pauline to advance to the second stage.

[73][74] In the second stage Pernilla Wahlgren and Crucified Barbara competed against each other, as did Kalle Moraeus & Orsa Spelmän and Jessica Andersson.

Wahlgren and Andersson were the winning acts, and progressed to the final with their songs "Jag vill om du vågar" and "I Did It for Love".

Acts performing in the interval act included Afro-dite, Charmed, Shirley Clamp, Maria Haukaas Storeng, Marie Rosenmir, One More Time, Lars-Ante Kuhmunen, Roger Pontare, Åge Sten "Glam" Nilsen of Wig Wam, Jakob Samuel of The Poodles, Towa Carson, Hanne Krogh, Kikki Danielsson, Bobbysocks!, Chips, and Kikki, Bettan & Lotta, concluding with Norway's Eurovision Song Contest 2009 winner Alexander Rybak.