She became the second performer to win the competition more than once, scoring victory with the pop ballad “Tattoo” and cementing her legacy in the highly celebrated, kitschy music contest.
Australia, which was represented by Western Australian rock band Voyager, earned a top 10 position, placing at ninth.
Loreen had previously won the contest in Baku in 2012, with her hit “Euphoria.”
Their latest win means Sweden tie Ireland for the most wins in the competition with seven, and it came 50 years after ABBA’s win with “Waterloo,” the moment that launched them to stardom.
The show was held in Britain for the first time in more than two decades, after the country, which came in second place last year, stepped in to handle hosting duties on behalf of 2022 winners Ukraine. Hosting honors will go to the winners Sweden next year.
The UK presented a dramatic and moving show that paid tribute to those displaced by war and celebrated the music of both countries. But a request by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to address the show was turned down, organizers said on Friday.
Ukraine’s electronic duo Tvorchi finished a strong sixth, while Great Britain returned to their traditional position at the bottom of the leaderboard, sitting 25th, the penultimate place.
Sweden’s winner Loreen told CNN ahead of the final that her first win was “one of the biggest moments of my life.”
“Before ‘Euphoria,’ I was an artist struggling to find my way,” she said.
“It’s like my home, the Eurovision community,” added the singer. “It’s a safe space for me.”
She is the first woman to win the contest twice; only Irishman Johnny Logan has done it before.
“It feels crazy,” he said after his win was announced.
“This is so surreal man I’m happy and thankful, I’m thankful to all of you who voted for me.”
“The only thing I feel right now is so much love. Not in my wildest dreams did I think this was going to happen,” she said.
But he had to beat stiff competition from Finnish rapper Käärijä, whose energetic renditions of “Cha Cha Cha” throughout the week wowed fans and made him a strong contender for the crown.
The top five were completed by Israel, Italy and Norway.
Around the host city of Liverpool, ticketless Eurovision fans stormed venues to watch the show on giant screens, many waving Ukrainian flags.
The British government made 3,000 tickets available at reduced prices this week for people displaced from the country.
Eurovision is a festival famous for its eccentricity, and this year’s show lived up to the billing with an array of strong performances from 26 finalists.
It also catapulted the port city of Liverpool, the home of the Beatles, onto the continent’s cultural map.
“I knew that if we wanted to do this, it wasn’t just to check boxes for Ukraine. We wouldn’t just put up some billboards,” Claire McColgan, Liverpool’s director of culture, told CNN in preparation. “What you see in the city is a real mix between Scouse and Ukraine, which is what we wanted.”
