New Strictly Come Dancing couples to perform first live dance

The new couples for Strictly Come Dancing’s 2026 series will perform their first live dance during Saturday’s show.

It comes after last weekend’s launch episode of the BBC dancing show saw Love Island winner Dani Dyer reunited with Nikita Kuzmin, who she was partnered with last year before she was forced to pull out due to injury.

The show also saw the third all-female pairing in Strictly history, with Bethany Antonia and Nancy Xu dancing together – following Nicola Adams and Katya Jones in 2020, and Jayde Adams and Karen Hauer in 2022.

Professional dancer Dianne Buswell was paired with Big Brother presenter Will Best on her return to the show after giving birth to her first child with partner Joe Sugg.

After introducing the show, Willis said: “Never in a million years did I ever think I would get to dance with Strictly pros.”

Radebe added: “And I definitely never thought it would be the three of us standing in the spot.

Widdicombe interjected: “No, I’ll be honest, not many people did, Johannes.

“Why’s that got more of a laugh than I was hoping, but there we are, it’s a little bit overwhelming to be here, but we are so delighted.”

During the show, the trio presented in different combinations across both the dancefloor and in the auditorium.

The launch show opened with a dance number from the professionals, judges and new hosts, and showed the stars meeting their partners for the first time on the dancefloor, rather than during a pre-recorded video as has been the case in previous series.

In Saturday’s first live episode, Dyer and Kuzmin will perform a samba to Zara Larsson’s Lush Life, Antonia and Xu will do a quickstep to Stop This Flame by Celeste, and Buswell and Best will also perform a samba to Rock DJ by Robbie Williams.

The other couples performing will also include actress Jaime Winstone and Carlos Gu, soap star Lacey Turner and Vito Coppola, Gavin And Stacey actress Melanie Walters and Aljaz Skorjanec, singer Delta Goodrem and Kai Widdrington, and former Paralympian Dame Sarah Storey and Julian Caillon.

Strictly’s new couples are to perform live for the first time on Saturday (Guy Levy/BBC)

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Also taking part on Saturday night are reality TV star Cach Mercer and Maddie Ingoldsby, celebrity hairdresser Chris Appleton and Amy Dowden, former England footballer Shaun Wright-Phillips and Alexis Warr, skeleton racer Tabby Stoecker and Mark Karmalita, and social media’s John Nellis and Katya Jones.

Emmerdale’s Lawrence Robb and Jowita Przystal, and dog trainer Graeme Hall and Lauren Oakley complete the line-up.

It comes after Strictly’s launch episode attracted a peak of 5.8 million viewers, according to the BBC’s overnight figures – 200,000 more viewers at its peak than last year’s launch show.