Image source, Getty Images

Here's the full breakdown of who's up doing what during tonight's convention, from 01:00 to 03:00 GMT:

• Nevada Senator Catherine Cortez Masto
• Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer
• South Carolina Congressman Jim Clyburn
• Convention Chairman, Mississippi Congressman Bennie Thompson
• Wisconsin Congresswoman Gwen Moore
• Former Ohio Governor John Kasich
• Alabama Senator Doug Jones
• Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar
• New York Governor Andrew Cuomo
• Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders
• Former First Lady Michelle Obama

Some of these speeches - most of which will be under two minutes in length - will be pre-recorded, but there will be a number of live addresses too.

We'll also see a number of musical performances:

• Maggie Rogers
• Leon Bridges
• Billy Porter
• Stephen Stills

There will be a lot of focus on battleground states in the US election. They're places which could plausibly vote Republican or Democrat given a swing in votes. So where are they? These are the battleground states in 2020, as identified by RealClearPolitics, external, a website that collates US political data. The list includes Wisconsin (WI), which is where the virtual Democratic convention is being “held”.

The electoral college referred to in the graphic is the body formed to formally elect the US president. Each state sends a number of electors - based on how many representatives it has in Congress - and whoever gets more than half of the 538 votes gets the keys to the White House.

Image source, Reuters

President Trump has kicked off convention season with his own series of campaign events.

As the Democrats begin their show, the US president has started a week of travel across so-called battleground states - areas which could reasonably vote either Democrat or Republican - that will be key to winning the general election.

Trump made several appearances in Minnesota on Monday and next up is Wisconsin - where the Democratic convention is "anchored".

During his speeches, the president focused on "law and order" and escalated his criticism of Joe Biden, calling him a "puppet of left-wing extremists".

Tomorrow, Trump will visit the southwestern state of Arizona. While the rest of his schedule remains uncertain, on Thursday - when Biden will make his nomination acceptance speech - the president is expected to be in his Democratic rival's hometown of Scranton, Pennsylvania.

The Democrats are celebrating a notable and timely scalp - a former Trump official turning against the president.

Miles Taylor, ex-chief of staff to the former Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, called the Trump administration "terrifying" in a new ad for the political group Republican Voters Against Trump.

Taylor called Trump one of the most "unfocused and undisciplined senior executives" and accused him of trying to "exploit the Department of Homeland Security for his own political purposes".

"Even though I'm not a Democrat, even though I disagree on key issues I'm confident that Joe Biden will protect the country and I'm confident he won't make the same mistakes as this president."

It's a given that this year's convention season won't be like previous ones, Covid has seen to that. But what happens at conventions and why do the parties have them? Watch our really simple guide,

Jon Sopel
BBC North America Editor

How do you start a party in an empty room? That is not to be flippant, but it is in a nutshell the conundrum the Democrats face this week as they don’t gather in Milwaukee for their convention. Campaigning in a time of Covid is challenging. Every four years the balloons are inflated, the confetti is sliced and diced into a million different pieces, all ready to rain down on tens of thousands of delegates dressed in red, white and blue, packed tight into an arena. Not this time. There is no coming together. And that is going to make it extremely difficult to generate excitement and momentum – the main purpose of these quadrennial shindigs. There is one formal bit of business: confirming that the presumptive nominee becomes the actual nominee of the Democratic Party. The Biden/Harris ticket will be confirmed. Senator Harris does seem to have brought a buzz. But Joe Biden – so far – doesn’t seem to be generating much excitement. The main reason that Democrats have given for voting for him, external is that he’s not Donald Trump.

Yes, polls at the moment show Biden ahead. Yes, they show disapproval of the president’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic. But polls will tighten, and it’s precarious just to rely on your opponent’s unpopularity. It’s hard not to like Joe Biden. He is Mr Geniality – but that alone doesn’t win you the most powerful job in the world. The Democrats have a job of work to do if they are going to win in November.

Image source, Getty Images

Even without the roaring crowds and falling confetti, the Democrats are still putting on quite the remote show.

Each of the four convention days this week will showcase a different theme - tonight’s is “We the people”, a reference to the iconic first line of the US Constitution.

Convention planners have also promised to showcase the voices of Americans who are taking on challenges from racial injustice to the Covid-19 pandemic.

So what can we look forward to on day one?

• Expect it to feel more like a TV special than a traditional convention: we’re getting two-hours of primetime events
• Most speeches will be shorter - just two minutes on average for non-headliners
• Tonight we’ll get to hear keynotes from Senator (and two-time presidential hopeful) Bernie Sanders and former First Lady Michelle Obama
• We’ll also hear from several prominent Republicans - including John Kasich, the former Ohio governor who ran against Trump in 2016
• Don’t worry, it won’t be just politicians on the virtual stage - there will be musical performances from Maggie Rogers and Leon Bridges to get the evening started on a high note
• Throughout, we’ll get live reaction shots from "real Americans" around the US

Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the all-virtual Democratic National Convention 2020. We'll be bringing you all the build-up ahead of the opening night of the four-day spectacle which kicks off at 01:00 GMT Tuesday.

We'll be live streaming the event on this page and will have rolling coverage of every significant moment and speech as the Democrats formally launch Joe Biden's bid for the White House.

Expect insight from the BBC's team of correspondents in the US and beyond, reaction from real America and all the context and colour you need to make sense of what - thanks to Covid-19 - promises to be a very unconventional political showpiece.