Malvern, Worcestershire, UK

Cher Lloyd (born 23 September 1993)from Malvern, where she lives with her parents Darren and Dina, brother Josh, 15, and sisters Sophie, 14, and Rosie, 12. She is of Romany ancestry through her mother. She studied performing arts at Dyson Perrins CE Sports College in 2009. She auditioned for The X Factor twice before (when the minimum age was lower) singing ballads but it was only after reinventing herself that she got through to see the judges. Lloyd has previously performed at holiday camps and said she gets a mixed reaction to her music. She auditioned singing the Keri Hilson version of "Turn My Swag On". At bootcamp she sang a rap version of "Viva La Vida"adding lyrics she claimed to have written herself, but this was disputed and reports claimed she took them from a song by rapper Swizz Beatz. At the judges' houses she performed "Cooler Than Me" but suffered a throat infection and was unable to complete her song. She was given a second chance, but broke down sobbing and could not complete the song. Despite this, she was picked as one of the final three girls by mentor Cole.

Lloyd sang a rendition of "Just Be Good to Me" in the first of the live shows. In the second live show she sang "Hard Knock Life (Ghetto Anthem)". In the third live show, she sang a mashup of "No Diggity" and "Shout", and in the fourth live show she sang "Stay". This was the first time Lloyd did not rap in her performance, and Cowell even called it "the performance of the series". In week five, Lloyd sang "Empire State of Mind", but judges stated that after last week they were disappointed, and Cowell said it was copycat. In the seventh week, Lloyd was in the bottom two for the first time after her rendition of "Imagine", but Cowell, Cole and Walsh all saved her in the final showdown, resulting in Paije Richardson being eliminated. In the following week Cher performed "Girlfriend", followed by "Walk This Way". Both performances were credited by the judges and she was saved by the public vote the following night, securing her position in the semi final. In the semi-final, Lloyd performed "Nothin' on You" and "Love the Way You Lie" and was in the bottom two with Mary Byrne. She was saved by the judges again and put through to the final, even though voting statistics after the show revealed that Lloyd had the fewest votes. In the final she performed a mash-up of "The Clapping Song" and "Get Ur Freak On", followed by a duet with will.i.am, which was a mashup of "Where Is the Love?" and "I Gotta Feeling". Lloyd was then eliminated in fourth place, having received the fewest public votes.

After the final, it was announced that Lloyd had been signed by Syco Music.Her debut album has been confirmed and is due for release on 12 September 2011. She has worked with songwriter Autumn Rowe and producer RedOne. Her debut single is called "Swagger Jagger", produced by Beyonce collaborator Diplo, which will be played for the first time on 20 June. However, the song was leaked on June 15. Lloyd has been confirmed for T4 on the Beach. The single "Swagger Jagger" was leaked onto the internet on 15 June[56] however, this version was later confirmed as only the demo of the track on Cher's Twitter account.