Vote counting schedule available for viewing
Voting ends and counting begins at 6pm on election day, Saturday 19 October 2024.
You can view live updates of the election results online.
View:
- 2024 election results once the count begins
- a YouTube video on how we count the votes.
Election night
Once the polls close, officials begin the count and some preliminary results become available.
Votes cast at early voting centres
Within one hour of the polls closing, results from electronic voting at early voting centres are likely to become available.
These results include:
- first preference results
- a preliminary distribution of preferences for each electorate.
Including all early voting electronic votes in the first preliminary distribution of preferences gives an early indication of possible successful candidates. This is available early on election night.
How indicative this is of a final result is dependent on both:
- how many electronic votes are cast
- how close the margins are at the various exclusion and election points of the distribution process.
In 2020, 70% of all votes cast were cast electronically at early voting centres.
Votes cast on paper ballots during the early voting period are not counted on election night. First preferences for early paper votes are usually published early in the week following election day.
Votes cast at electronic polling places on election day
The early voting centres continue to offer both electronic and paper ballots up to and on election day.
First preference results from electronic votes cast on election day become available within 1-2 hours of polls closing.
A second preliminary distribution of preferences combines both the election day electronic votes and the early voting electronic votes. This is available late on election night.
Votes cast at polling places on election day
For paper-based votes, each polling place completes a count of first preferences after the polls close.
The first preference results are published as each polling place finishes their count.
For work health and safety reasons, all polling locations are instructed to cease counting at 10:30pm. In the unlikely event that a polling location has not successfully transmitted their first preference election results by 10:30pm, this information will not become available until early in the week following election day.
Postal votes
We don’t count postal votes on election night.
After election night
The final counting happens after election night.
Ballot scanning, verification and distribution of preferences
Ballot paper scanning begins the Monday following election day.
On the Monday and Tuesday, Elections ACT prioritises scanning:
- the first batches of returned postal votes
- early voting paper ballots
- declaration votes
- votes from polling places that took less than 20 votes for an electorate.
Read about scanning paper ballots
At the end of each day of scanning, Elections ACT combines any votes from fully scanned polling places with the electronic votes distributed on election night.
We’ll then publish an updated interim distribution of preferences.
This will continue until we’ve scanned and approved every ballot paper.
Officially declaring the result
Elections ACT only officially declares the results when we’ve:
- received all votes (including postal votes)
- determined final quotas
- completed full distributions of preferences.
The deadline for Elections ACT to receive postal votes is on 5pm Friday 25 October 2024.
This means the final count can only happen once that time has passed.
The formal declaration of the result isn’t likely until the middle of the week commencing Monday 28 October 2024.