United Kingdom in the Eurovision Song Contest 2006
The United Kingdom was represented at the Eurovision Song Contest 2006 by Daz Sampson with the song "Teenage Life". He finished in 19th place with 25 points.
Before Eurovision
''Eurovision: Making Your Mind Up''
Eurovision: Making Your Mind Up was the national final developed by the BBC in order to select the British entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 2006. Six acts competed in a televised show on 4 March 2006 held at the BBC Television Centre in London and hosted by Terry Wogan and Natasha Kaplinsky. The winner was selected entirely through a public vote.Competing entries
BBC collaborated with radio director and Fame Academy judge, Richard Park, to compile a shortlist of entries and select six finalists to compete in the national final. An additional entry was provided to Park and the BBC by BBC Radio 2 which ran an open submission process where a professional panel consisting of Mike Batt, Simon Webbe and Hugh Goldsmith selected the winning song from the received submissions. The six competing songs were announced on 16 February 2006.Final
Six acts compete in the televised final on 4 March 2006. A public vote consisting of regional televoting, online voting and SMS voting selected the winner, "Teenage Life" performed by Daz Sampson. Each region awarded 2, 4, 6, 8 and 12 points to their top five songs. An additional set of votes were the results of the online vote, which had a weighting equal to the votes of a single region. Celebrities delivered these results in a deliberate echo of the Eurovision Song Contest itself. The SMS vote was awarded based on the percentage of votes each song achieved. For example, if a song gained 10% of the SMS vote, then that entry would be awarded 10 points.A panel of experts provided feedback regarding the songs during the show. The panel consisted of Kelly Osbourne, Jonathan Ross, Fearne Cotton and Bruno Tonioli. When asked to predict the winner, Osbourne and Ross opted for Daz Sampson whilst Cotton and Tonioli opted for Antony Costa.
| Draw | Artist | Song | Composer | Televote | Internet | SMS | Total | Place |
| 1 | Goran Kay | "Play Your Game" | Goran Kay, Hugo de Chaire | 6 | 2 | 6 | 14 | 6 |
| 2 | Kym Marsh | "Whisper to Me" | Danny Orton, Melissa Pierce | 40 | 4 | 9 | 53 | 4 |
| 3 | Daz Sampson | "Teenage Life" | Daz Sampson, John Matthews | 72 | 12 | 37 | 121 | 1 |
| 4 | City Chix | "All About You" | Wayne Hector, Deni Lew, Pete Glenister | 32 | 6 | 17 | 55 | 3 |
| 5 | Four Story | "Hand on My Heart" | Roachie, Andy Wright | 12 | 0 | 5 | 17 | 5 |
| 6 | Antony Costa | "It's a Beautiful Thing" | John McLaughlin, Michael Daley, Stanley Andrew, Alison Pearce | 62 | 8 | 26 | 96 | 2 |
Minor controversies
Prior to the broadcast of the final, claims were made by Eurovision news website Oikotimes that "Teenage Life", and "It's a Beautiful Thing", had both been commercially released prior to 1 October 2005, which would disqualify either song from representing the UK under European Broadcasting Union rules. The BBC responded with a rebuttal of the claims, stating that the original version of "Teenage Life" was released by Spacekats in March 2004 on the Riff Raff label through Juno Records, only as a 'White Label' record. Therefore the song complies with EBU rules."Teenage Life" includes a choir of young girls and during the performance on Making Your Mind Up their voices were mimed by older dancers. Such a performance would fall foul of EBU rules which prohibits miming and restricts the number of performers allowed on stage. Therefore, for the performance at Eurovision, the vocals were sung live by the dancers. One of the dancers were replaced due to the complications that would have been involved in taking her to the event.
At Eurovision
As a member of the Big Four, the United Kingdom automatically qualified to compete in the final held on 20 May. Daz Sampson was drawn to perform fifteenth in the line-up. At the end of the contest, the song finished 19th with a respectable 25 points. Although lowly placed, the United Kingdom still managed to receive points from ten different countries. Coming up to the 1,000th song, the United Kingdom's entry this year was the 994th song in the Eurovision Song Contest's history.Points awarded by the United Kingdom
Semi final
Final
| 12 points | 10 points | 8 points | 7 points | 6 points |
| 5 points | 4 points | 3 points | 2 points | 1 point |