UK general election poll tracker: Labor ahead as election approaches

The next UK general election is just around the corner, with most analysts expecting it to take place later this year.

Keir Starmer’s Labor Party has led the polls since early 2022 after 13 years of Conservative rule.

The latest that a general election can be held is January 2025. Chancellor Rishi Sunak has the power to call a general election at any time before that, but experts believe he will delay it to stay in office longer in the face of a potential defeat.

The Guardian will track the latest polling averages from all the UK’s major polling companies leading up to election day.

The figures used by the Guardian in the chart above do not include the Scottish National Party (SNP). In UK-wide opinion polls, the SNP’s share of the national vote is between 2% and 4%. But its geographic concentration in Scotland means it will win more seats than other smaller parties such as the Greens, which have similar national share of the vote. A Scotland-only poll would give a better indication of how Scotland will fare at the next election than the national polls mentioned above.

In Britain’s first-past-the-post electoral system, opinion polls can only predict who will win. What matters is the number of seats each party wins in parliament, which is determined by each race in the 650 constituencies.

Seat predictions vary, but the ones we show above are from Pollster election calculations. It conducts its own polls and collects demographic data from its survey respondents.

This data is fed into a mathematical model called Multilevel regression and post-stratification (MRP) modelsthe aim is to estimate the association between characteristics such as age, gender and the region where a person lives, and which party they will vote for.

Matching this with data on the types of people living in different constituencies across the UK, the electoral calculus can predict which party will come out on top in each constituency.

How accurate are seat predictions?

In the UK’s first-past-the-post system, there is no clear correlation between numbers in opinion polls and seats, as it depends on where the votes are cast. Rob Ford, professor of politics at the University of Manchester, described general poll seat predictions as “loose standards”, saying: “Labour could be 15 points ahead but not get a majority; 10 points ahead, Mostly. It depends on where those votes are.”

If the election is close, polls are less able to predict the outcome. Other limitations of predicting seat numbers from national polls include that it is difficult to extrapolate the Lib Dem seat numbers from national polls because, although their national support is much lower than that of the two main parties, in some constituencies they are Have significant influence. National polls on what will happen in Scotland also don’t provide much information, and polls there are even more rare.

Data annotation

The chart shows the 10-day rolling average of support for each party based on UK national opinion polls. This does not include Northern Ireland, which has different political parties. On any given day, the Guardian calculates the average support rating for each party in any poll published in the past 10 days.Only voting companies that are members of the organization are voted on British Public Opinion Research Council be included.

Seat forecasts are obtained monthly from electoral calculus, which applies models to polls and demographic data to estimate the number of seats each party is likely to win. They update this forecast monthly.

Illustrations by Sam Cole