General elections were held in Brazil on 4 October 2026 to elect the president, vice president, members of the National Congress, the governors, vice governors and legislative assemblies of all federative units, and the district council of Fernando de Noronha. As no candidate for president (and for governor in some states) received more than half of the valid votes in the first round, a runoff election was held on 25 October.
In the first round, senator Flávio Bolsonaro of the state of Rio de Janeiro, the eldest son of former president Jair Bolsonaro, led with 47% of the vote over incumbent president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's 45%. In the second round, Lula overcame his first-round loss and was re-elected in an upset victory to a fourth non-consecutive term as president, outperforming his 2022 result. It was the first instance of a Brazilian presidential election in which the winner of the first round was defeated in the runoff.
Background
Having unsuccessfully run for president in 1989, 1994 and 1998, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of the left-wing Workers' Party was elected in 2002 and 2006. He was then succeeded by his chief of staff, Dilma Rousseff, who was elected in 2010 and 2014. In 2016, Rousseff was removed from office due to administrative misconduct and was succeeded by her vice president, Michel Temer, of the centrist Brazilian Democratic Movement. Lula attempted to run for president again, but was prevented due to his conviction on corruption charges in 2017 as part of Operation Car Wash and imprisoned in 2018. Right-wing candidate Jair Bolsonaro of the Social Liberal Party was elected president in 2018. Bolsonaro left the Social Liberal Party in 2019 and joined the Liberal Party in 2021.
A series of rulings by the Supreme Federal Court (STF) questioning the legality of Lula's trial led to his release from prison in 2019 and the restoration of his political rights by 2021. Lula narrowly defeated Bolsonaro in the 2022 presidential election, securing a non-consecutive third term. In response to his loss, some Bolsonaro supporters demanded a military coup to prevent Lula's inauguration, but failed to gather sufficient support. Bolsonaro was subsequently convicted by the STF, barred from running for a second term before 2030, and arrested in 2025. He endorsed his eldest son, Senator Flávio Bolsonaro.
Electoral system
Brazil's president and vice president are elected as a joint ticket using the two-round system. The first round of elections is held on the first Sunday of October (in this instance, 4 October 2026). A candidate who receives more than half of the valid votes in the first round is elected.
If this threshold is not met by any candidate, the two candidates with the most votes in the first round advance to a second round of voting, held on the last Sunday of October (in this case, 25 October 2026). The candidate with the most votes in the second round is elected. Elections for governors and vice governors of all 26 states and of the Federal District are held on the same dates and with the same two-round system as the presidential election.
Two-thirds of the 81 members of the Brazilian Senate are up for election in 2026, two senators being elected from each of the states and the Federal District using plurality block voting. The other third of the Senate was elected in 2022.
All 513 members of the Chamber of Deputies (federal deputies) are elected from 27 multi-member constituencies corresponding to the states and the Federal District, varying in size from 8 to 70 seats. All members of the state legislative assemblies (state deputies) and of the Legislative Chamber of the Federal District (district deputies), varying in size from 24 to 94 seats, are also elected. These elections are held using open list, proportional representation, with seats allocated using integer quotients and the D'Hondt method.
All seven members of the District Council of Fernando de Noronha are elected by single non-transferable vote. Unlike elections for other offices in Brazil, candidates for this council are not nominated by political parties.
Voters
Voting in Brazil is allowed for citizens over 16 years of age and mandatory for literate citizens between 18 and 70 years of age, except conscripts, who are not allowed to vote during their period of mandatory military service. Those who are required but do not vote in an election and do not present an acceptable justification, such as being absent from their voting locality at the time, must pay a fine, normally R$3.51, equivalent to about US$0.70 as of 2026. In some cases, the fine may be waived, reduced, or increased by up to 10 times.
Brazilian citizens residing abroad may only vote for president and vice president. Under the Equality Statute between Brazil and Portugal, Portuguese citizens legally residing in Brazil for more than three years may also register to vote in Brazilian elections.
About 158.7 million people were eligible to vote in the 2026 Brazilian elections.
Candidates and political parties
All candidates for federal, state, Federal District, and municipal offices must be nominated by a political party. For offices to be elected by majority or plurality (executive offices and senators), parties may form an electoral coalition (coligação) to nominate a single candidate. The coalitions do not need to be composed of the same parties for every nomination, do not need to be maintained after the election, and are not valid for offices to be elected proportionally (deputies and aldermen).
Parties may also form a different type of alliance called federation (federação), which acts as a single party to nominate candidates for all offices in all locations, including those to be elected proportionally, and must be maintained with a single leadership structure over the course of the elected legislature. Federations may also act as parties to form coalitions. For the 2026 election, the registered federations are Brazil of Hope (PT–PCdoB–PV), Always Forward (PSDB–Cidadania), PSOL REDE Federation (PSOL–REDE), Solidary Renewal (PRD–Solidarity), and Progressive Union (Union–PP).
For offices to be elected proportionally, each party must nominate candidates of each sex in a distribution between 30 and 70%. Parties must also allocate their funds and broadcast time proportionally to the number of their candidates of each sex and race, with a minimum of 30% of funds for Black and Brown candidates.
Procedure
Voting in Brazilian elections can only be done in person and only on election day, which is always a Sunday. There is no provision for postal or early voting. Voter registration must be done in advance, and each voter can only vote in one designated voting station, either based on the voter's registered domicile or at a different location that the voter must specifically request if planning to be there temporarily on election day. Voters must provide photo identification at their voting station before proceeding to vote.
About 95,000 voting stations are installed in all municipalities of Brazil, the Federal District, and Fernando de Noronha. Most voting stations are in public schools. In some sparsely populated areas, such as indigenous territories, the installation and use of voting stations requires extensive travel and logistics. Voting stations are also installed in 164 locations in other countries, mostly in Brazilian diplomatic missions, for citizens residing abroad.
Voting is done almost entirely on direct-recording electronic voting machines, designed for extreme simplicity. The voter dials a number corresponding to the desired candidate or party, causing the name and photo of the candidate or party to appear on the screen, then the voter presses a green button to confirm or an orange button to correct and try again. It is also possible to leave the vote blank by pressing a white button, or to nullify the vote by dialing a number that does not correspond to any candidate or party. Paper ballots are only used in case a voting machine malfunctions or in locations abroad with fewer than 100 voters.
The electronic system is subject to extensive tests, including on machines randomly selected from actual voting stations on election day, witnessed by political parties to rule out fraud. After voting ends, every machine prints a record of its total votes for each candidate or party, which is publicly displayed for comparison with the results published electronically. The system delivers the complete election results usually a few hours after voting ends, which is extremely fast for such a large population as Brazil. However, the system does not create a physical record of individual votes to allow a full recount.
Voting stations operate at the same time in the whole country, regardless of their time zone: 9:00 to 18:00 UTC−02:00, 8:00 to 17:00 UTC−03:00, 7:00 to 16:00 UTC−04:00, and 6:00 to 15:00 UTC−05:00. The unified voting time does not apply to voting stations for citizens abroad, which operate from 8:00 to 17:00 local time, ranging from 16 hours before to 4 hours after those in Brazil.
Administration
Unusual in the world, Brazilian elections are administered by the judiciary. Brazil has one Superior Electoral Court (Tribunal Superior Eleitoral, TSE), and each state and the Federal District have a Regional Electoral Court (Tribunal Regional Eleitoral, TRE), all headed by judges selected from other courts. The electoral courts are responsible for judicial tasks such as ruling on disputes and potential violations of electoral law, and for implementing the elections, such as registering voters and candidates, installing voting machines, counting votes, publishing the results, and issuing regulations and monitoring compliance.
Campaign
Early developments
In late October 2025, President Lula da Silva announced the beginning of his re-election campaign, for his fourth presidential term. Some media sources and opposition figures raised concerns about Lula's age, especially following a fall and brain bleed he suffered in December 2024. Polls at the time from Quaest reported that 38% of respondents made crime their primary concern.
In December 2025, Flávio Bolsonaro, senator of Rio de Janeiro and son of the imprisoned Jair Bolsonaro, announced his intended candidacy. Shortly after his announcement, he suggested dropping out of the campaign in return for favors, saying "There's a possibility I won't go all the way, ... have a price for that. I will negotiate." Many believed this meant that Bolsonaro was saying he would drop out of the election if his father was released from prison. Bolsonaro later retracted this statement saying that after speaking with his father, he would continue with his campaign.
Following the first-round results, the Fluminense Federal University (UFF) was the first university to mobilize students to take to the streets on the day after the election, in a movement that inspired other educational institutions across the country. The first demonstration was organised organically and spontaneously, out of a mixture of "anger and fear". Residents came down from their apartment buildings to join the protest, which drew approximately 2,000 to 3,000 people. In his victory speech, Lula gave special thanks to the students who had mobilised across Brazil.
Lula made efforts to make the Constitutional Amendment to End the 6x1 Work Schedule pass, and in October Flávio, as a senator, made the opposition to vote in favor of it. Bolsonaro once said the proposal was "opportunistic" because it was presented on the eve of the election.
Corruption scandals
Corruption was a top concern for many voters during the campaign, and a wide-ranging scandal involving politicians and STF justices dominated headlines before the first round. Two cases involved figures from both the government and the opposition.