Sixteen countries participated in the contest, with Estonia participating for the first time and Germany returning after its absence from the previous edition, while Kazakhstan and Serbia did not take part. This was also the first and so far only time that all members of the "Big Five" from the Eurovision Song Contest took part in the junior contest together.
The result also marked France equaling Georgia 's record for the most Junior Eurovision victories. Spain , Armenia , the United Kingdom and Ukraine completed the top five. Further down the table, Germany achieved its best result to date, Georgia tied its worst placement, and Ireland placed last for the first time. Unlike in the Eurovision Song Contest , the winning country did not receive the automatic rights to host the next contest.
However, since , each contest has been hosted by the previous year's winning country, and since with the exceptions of and , the winning country has had the right of first refusal on hosting the following competition. In , Italy was given the option to host but ultimately opted out of it.
On 29 August , the EBU announced that 16 countries would participate in the contest, with Estonia making its debut and Germany returning after a one-year absence, while Kazakhstan and Serbia would not take part after participating in the previous contest.
Prior to the contest, a digital compilation album featuring all the songs from the contest was put together by the European Broadcasting Union and released by Universal Music on 3 November A new child safety protocol focused on the well-being of the participants was implemented for the contest.
