The Liberals remain well in front of the pack, however, with 45.3% of the vote (+0.2 from last week, thanks in large part to a big 50% in last week’s Léger poll and an uptick in the Nanos tracker). They are leading in 219 seats, down one, and win an average of 208.2 seats (-1.7) in the projection model’s simulations.

The Conservatives are up 0.4 points since last week’s update to 33.9%, giving them the lead in 86 ridings (+5) and netting them an average of 103.5 seats (+4) in the projection model. Much of this increase in the seat projection is in Ontario, where the Conservatives flipped nine seats back to them as the Liberals slipped below 50% and the Conservatives got themselves back over 35% after falling below that threshold in the two previous updates. Those swings were nearly made-up for by the Liberals, however, in B.C. and Quebec.

After surging in the projection last week, the New Democrats only fell back a little this week with 10% (-0.8). They are leading in 15 seats (-1) and win an average of 11 (-1) in the projection. That has them still flirting with, but not guaranteed to win, recognized party status.

For fully interactive charts, tables and maps, head to The Writ’s website:

A small uptick for the Liberals in Quebec has flipped three seats back to them from the Bloc Québécois, which drops the Bloc down to leading in 21 seats and winning 18.7 (-1.6) on average.

Good numbers for the Greens in British Columbia have boosted them to 2.4% nationally (+0.3) and their average seat haul to 1.6 (+0.3), with their high range reaching three seats for the first time since the last election.

Of course, all of these numbers are merely a reflection of where public opinion is at the moment. They are unlikely to be tested at the ballot box anytime soon — except in at least five ridings across the country where sitting MPs have indicated they will resign over the summer. We don’t know when those resignations will actually occur or when byelections will be called to fill the vacancies. But where do things stand in those five ridings right now?

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Full regional breakdowns and tracking charts are available for subscribers below, as are complete riding-level projections. A full methodological explanation of how the vote and seat projection model works can be found here.

The Vote Projection is based primarily on a weighted average of all publicly-available national and regional polls. The weighted average is then used to project the outcome in all 343 ridings across the country, taking into account local candidates. Those individual riding-level projections are then weighted by the number of eligible voters in each riding and past turnout to determine the national vote projection for each party.

The Seat Projection shows the number of seats in which each party is projected to be ahead. Parties are assigned a range of likely vote share in each riding based on past polling and modelling errors and 10,000 simulations are run to assign to each party a number of ridings in which they are in contention. The High and Low ranges take into account 95% of all likely outcomes, while the Avg. Projection shows the average number of seats each party wins in these simulations, which takes into account the tendency for parties to under- or out-perform their polls.

Wondering how to interpret the Seat Projection and the Avg. Projection? While the Seat Projection is The Writ’s “official call”, the Avg. Projection is an important guide to understanding the projections, in conjunction with the high and low ranges. Seat projections are rarely right on target, so the Avg. Projection should set expectations. In other words, if the Seat Projection for a party is 25 seats but the Avg. Projection is 21.2, your expectation should be that the party will win around 25 seats, with a greater likelihood that the party under-performs that target rather than beats it.

The percentage of simulations in which each party wins a majority or a plurality of seats is shown below.

Complete riding and sub-regional projections are available for subscribers of The Writ:

A full breakdown of the methodology behind the vote and seat projection model can be found here:

The table below includes all recent federal voting intentions polls that are publicly available. You can click or tap on the name of the polling firm in the left-most column to go directly to that polling firm’s original poll release. Rows containing polls conducted in a single region are highlighted in different colours.

Vote and seat projections broken down by region and tracking charts going back to the 2025 election are available for subscribers of The Writ below 👇

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Detailed projections for all 343 ridings across the country, as well as vote projections for smaller regions within each province, are available for subscribers below 👇

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On October 19, Albertans will be voting on 10 referendum questions, including several on immigration and constitutional issues. But there will also be a question related to Alberta independence, though asked in a roundabout way. The wording of the question is:

“Should Alberta remain a province of Canada or should the Government of Alberta commence the legal process required under the Canadian Constitution to hold a binding provincial referendum on whether or not Alberta should separate from Canada?”

With many polls likely to be published in the coming months on this issue, The Writ has launched the Alberta Referendum Poll Tracker, which will aggregate all of the polls published during this campaign. The chart below shows the current polling average, encompassing all polls, regardless of question wording, that include results on Alberta separation in general or the referendum question in particular. The chart on the left shows the current average with undecideds shown, while the chart on the right is after the removal of undecideds.

The table below includes all publicly available polls on Alberta independence conducted since the beginning of 2026. Note that the question wording is not always consistent between pollsters (Léger, for example, has included an option of Alberta joining the United States in its questionnaire, which has been grouped into the “Independence” column below). When both a generic independence question and the exact wording of the referendum question is included in a poll, the latter result is shown in this table.

You can click or tap on the name of the polling firm in the left-most column to go directly to that polling firm’s original poll release.

The method used to calculate the polling average is similar to the methodology described here for The Writ’s Vote and Seat Projections. No adjustments are made to the polls, however, to take into account any potential turnout effects.

The polling averages broken down by region, demographics and voting intentions, as well as tracking charts going back to the beginning of this year, are available for subscribers of The Writ below 👇

Regional, demographic and partisan polling averages

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Is it a blip? We’ll have to wait to find out.

The Liberals dropped one point in the vote projection to 45.1%, the lowest they’ve been since the end of February. The party now leads in 220 ridings across the country, a drop of 10 seats since last week, while their average number of seat wins has dropped 5.1 seats to 209.9.

The Conservatives and Bloc have hardly budged in the vote projection, but they’ve both jumped four seats apiece in the number of ridings in which they are projected to be leading with 81 and 24, respectively. Their average number of seat wins in the projection was up 0.9 and 1.5 seats, to 99.5 and 20.3, respectively. This reflects how a few toss-up ridings in which they were trailing last week have flipped over, but since they already had a decent chance of winning them their average number of seat wins hasn’t shifted so dramatically.

Not so for the New Democrats. The party is up 1.5 points nationally to 10.8%, the first time the NDP has hit double-digits since mid-January. The party is leading in 16 ridings, a gain of two since last week, but more importantly wins an average of 12.0 seats in the model. That’s a jump of 2.6 seats from last week and puts them in a position to regain recognized party status — even after taking into account the party’s tendency to under-perform the polls and the number of close contests the NDP is involved in.

For fully interactive charts, tables and maps, head to The Writ’s website:

What’s behind this jump for the New Democrats? A big part of it is the five-point jump in NDP support in this week’s Liaison Strategies poll, from 11% last week to 16% this week. The other polls added to the model in this update (from Pallas and Nanos) have the party in the more-usual 11% to 13% range, but the real test for the NDP will be whether their apparent bump into the low-to-mid-teens is replicated in the next set of polls from Abacus Data and Léger, which have routinely had the New Democrats stuck in single-digits.

I’ll delve more deeply into the polling numbers in the Weekly Writ newsletter on Thursday. Perhaps we’ll already have some more numbers to help us understand what may or may not be happening to the NDP. Stay tuned!

It’s a referendum that could prove to be the country’s most impactful vote since the referendum on Quebec independence in 1995. And, just like that referendum (and the one before it in 1980), it might be just as effective at putting the issue of separation to bed.

With the referendum now confirmed, many polls on the question will undoubtedly be published over the next five months. We’ve already seen over the last year that polls can differ quite significantly on this issue. To try to simplify matters for readers (and to give you a one-stop-shop for polls on the Alberta referendum), I’ve launched The Writ’s Alberta Referendum Poll Tracker, an aggregation of all the recent Alberta independence polls that have been published and all those that will be published between now and October 19.

In the first update, the “Remain” side is leading comfortably with just under 63% support, with support for independence (or the beginning of the process toward independence) sitting at just 30%. After the removal of undecideds, support for remaining in Canada hits two-thirds.

The Poll Tracker will be updated regularly as new polls are published. All polls on Alberta independence are included, but questions that use the actual wording of the referendum take precedence over questions that more refer to separation more generally. Hopefully, as we approach the actual vote, pollsters will have transitioned to asking the referendum question (or how people intend to vote in the referendum).

The provincewide averages, as well as the database of polls (with links to the original releases), will be publicly available on The Writ. Paid subscribers will get to go a little deeper, and will have access to the tracking charts and regional, demographic and partisan polling averages. If you aren’t already a subscriber and would like to get access to all the numbers (as well as the federal Vote and Seat Projections), now’s the time to take the plunge!

Subscribe now

This referendum campaign is one that will have reverberations that we will certainly feel across the country for the next few months, and possibly for the next few years (and, maybe, decades). If the polls continue to show that the “Remain” side should win, that doesn’t mean there won’t still be repercussions in Canadian politics. Prime Minister Mark Carney and Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre will have to wade into this campaign, while Alberta Premier Danielle Smith appears to be gambling not only the unity of the country on this referendum, but potentially her own leadership of the divided United Conservative Party, too. As the polls suggest, Smith’s position on the side of Canada in this referendum seems to put her at odds with most of her party’s own supporters.

For fully interactive charts, tables and maps, head to The Writ’s website:

So, this will be an ongoing story and I hope the Alberta Referendum Poll Tracker will help you navigate the deluge of polling numbers we can expect.

Speaking of which, the Vote and Seat Projections were also updated today. They continue to show the Liberals with a big, growing seat advantage over the Conservatives.

I’ll delve more deeply into the federal polls published over the last week in Thursday’s Weekly Writ, but the biggest driver of the Liberals’ dominance in the seat projection is Ontario. The three new polls added to the model all had the Liberals above 50% in Ontario, which is absolutely crushing for the Conservatives.

While the 230 Liberal seats and 77 Conservative seats look rather extreme in this projection, the Avg. Projection, which takes into account the number of toss-ups at stake as well as the tendency of parties to beat or under-perform their polls, still has the Liberals at (a comparatively modest) 215 seats against 99 for the Conservatives.

I’m increasingly leaning on the Avg. Projection rather than the Seat Projection in the model, as I feel it might be the more accurate reflection of likely outcomes. Yes, the Liberals are leading in 230 seats in the model, but so many of them are by tiny margins that it isn’t all that plausible they’d win all of them. I’ll keep mulling this over.

The Liberals are projected to be leading in 227 ridings across the country, a gain of three since last week and they highest the party has been in the model — not by a lot, mind you, as the party hit 226 seats in the April 21 update. But a new high is a new high.

This was partially due to new detailed regional polling out of Quebec from Synopsis Recherche which, among other things, tipped the Liberals into being favoured in Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, Alexandre Boulerice’s soon-to-be vacated seat. It’s worth emphasizing that much of the Liberals’ gains are in precarious territory, as reflected by the average of 213.9 seat wins in the model’s simulations, which is actually a drop of 1.6 seats since last week. The Liberals have moved ahead in more ridings than ever, but so many of them are projected to be marginal toss-ups that, inevitably, the Liberals can’t be expected to win them all.

The Conservatives continue to struggle with 33.8% in the vote projection, a drop of 0.2 points (following a drop of 0.5 points last week). This puts them tied for their lowest-ever vote share in the projection. Leading in only 82 seats puts them at their lowest point as well.

The New Democrats stand at 14 seats in the projection (winning nine on average) while the Bloc Québécois has slid behind in three seats, pushing them down to just 18. That also matches the party’s average number of wins.

For fully interactive charts, tables and maps, head to The Writ’s website:

The trend lines have simply been holding pretty stable for the Liberals — though perhaps there has been a sign of softening in some of the latest polls (more on that later this week in the Weekly Writ). But, for now, the regional numbers are still looking remarkably good for the party. Let’s take a look at them.

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Poilievre often references the number of votes his party received in the last election as a proof-point of the strength of his leadership and the importance of his Conservative opposition.

With the caveat that the Conservatives did not, in fact, receive 8.3 million votes in the last election (they received 8,113,484, which would normally be rounded off to 8.1 million, or maybe 8.2 million if one is being very generous, but not 8.3 million, a mistake that Poilievre has made before) Poilievre is not wrong that his opposition mandate comes from the millions of Canadians who voted for him in 2025.

But the rhetorical strength of that mandate is somewhat diminished when, today, the Conservatives no longer seem to have the support of 8.1 million Canadians (or, for that matter, 8.3 million).

According to The Writ’s latest update to the Vote and Seat Projection, the Conservatives currently sit at 34% support, a drop of 7.3 percentage points since the last election. That would suggest that, if an election were held today and if turnout was a constant, the Conservatives would receive roughly 6.7 million votes, a drop of just over 1.4 million in little more than a year.

We’ll delve into where these losses have occurred in a moment, but first here is where the projection stands this week:

There’s been little change since last week, with the Liberals up marginally to 46.3% and leading in 224 ridings. The projection awards them 215.5 seats on average (which takes into account potential polling and modelling errors), an increase of 4.1 seats since last week. The average Conservative seat haul has dropped 3.6 seats to 99.8. The New Democrats have ticked up a small amount to 9.1% of the vote and win an average of 8.3 seats, while the Bloc is largely unchanged.

For fully interactive charts, tables and maps, head to The Writ’s website:

But let’s take a deeper look at the Conservatives, where their losses have been steepest and why it’s a bit of a stretch to lean on the party’s results from more than a year ago.

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It suggests that the holding pattern in voting intentions that we’ve seen for the last two months is continuing unabated.

The Liberals lead in the projection with 46.2% of the vote, up 0.5 points from last week. If we round to the nearest full percentage, the Liberals have been holding at 46% in the projection since the March 3 update. The Conservatives are also up 0.5 points to 34.5%, while the New Democrats have dropped 0.6 points to 8.8%.

The Liberals are leading in 221 ridings in the projection. Taking into account potential polling and modelling errors, the Liberals are projected to win an average of 211.4 seats. Compared to last week, the Liberals are leading in three more seats but their average number of projected wins is up 1.4 — a reflection of how the Liberals have moved ahead in several toss-up seats that might not go their way in an actual election.

The Conservatives are leading in 86 seats, unchanged from last week, and win an average of 103.4, up only marginally. The NDP has lost the lead in three seats in the projection and is down 1.2 seats on average to just 7.9. The Bloc Québécois is holding steady with 19.4 projected seat wins (while they lead in 22).

For fully interactive charts, tables and maps, head to The Writ’s website:

I’ve had some questions about the difference between the “Seat Projection” and the “Avg. Projection”. Let me try to explain.

The model swings the results of the last election in each individual riding according to where the polls are today. Riding-level factors — such as the presence of an incumbent — are then taken into account. The Seat Projection shows the number of ridings in which each party is leading according to these calculations. This is, in other words, an estimation of how many seats each party would win if both the polls and the modelling was 100% accurate.

Of course, we know that 100% accuracy is impossible. Even if the polls were entirely correct, the model will make some riding-level errors because it is based on the assumption that all ridings will behave in a similar fashion. But some ridings will behave slightly differently than others — a party’s gain in Quebec might be more dramatic in some regions than in others even if, on average, it all comes out in the wash.

Then there is the error that we should expect in the polls. The polls will always be off by at least a little bit, but we don’t know in which direction. Will they over-estimate the Liberals and/or under-estimate the Conservatives, or vice-versa? The Seat Projection is agnostic on this, assuming that it is equally likely that the polls will be off in one direction or another for each party.

The Avg. Projection, however, is not agnostic about this. Using the past five elections as a guide, it assumes, for instance, that the Conservatives will beat their polls most of the time. For that reason, the Conservatives will be considered in contention to win more seats in which they trail than will the other parties. The Avg. Projection looks at all those seats where multiple parties are in contention, and assigns them randomly to one party or another in 10,000 simulations.

So, let’s apply this to this week’s projection. The Liberals lead in 221 seats and the Conservatives lead in 86 seats. But the Liberals are leading in more closely-contested seats than are the Conservatives. And, with the Conservative tendency to beat their polls, it seems likely that some of those toss-ups in which the Liberals lead will fall the Conservative way. Similarly, it is more likely that the Conservatives will hold more of the toss-ups in which they lead than would the Liberals.

As a result, the Liberals are projected to win an average of 211.4 seats, with the Conservatives winning 103.4 seats. In other words, the Liberals are expected to lose more of the closely-contested seats in which they are in contention than they win, while the Conservatives are expected to win more of those closely-contested seats than lose.

The model doesn’t “know” which seats these are, as this process is abstracted. But you can see which seats are the most likely to go either way in the Riding Projections. The “Toss” seats are the most uncertain — and it’s worthwhile to search them out. The Liberals, for instance, are projected to be leading in nine seats in Alberta, which would be quite a haul. But four of them are classified “Toss”. Based on historical precedent, that means they could be tough to actually win in practice, especially considering the Conservatives’ tendency to over-perform their polls by significant margins in Alberta. Two other Liberal seats in Alberta are “Edge” seats, the next-most uncertain classification.

So, even if the Liberals are projected to be leading in nine seats in Alberta, the real-world of an election might deliver them far fewer than that. This is what the Avg. Projection reflects.

Turns out, elections can be unpredictable, messy things, even in the best of times!

Since then, the Liberals have cobbled together a majority through floor-crossers and byelections, the Conservatives have seemingly lost their mojo and the New Democrats have replaced their leader. The odds of another election happening in the short or medium term has dropped significantly, even if the Liberals would easily secure an even bigger majority if they went to the polls today.

The Writ’s federal Vote and Seat Projection has the Liberals leading in 218 ridings and winning an average of 210 seats, a big gain from the 169 seats the party won a year ago. The Liberals have slipped back a little since last week, dropping 0.6 points to 45.7% and sliding in the seat projection, but that nevertheless keeps them in a very strong position.

The Conservatives have hardly budged at 34%, putting them 11.7 points behind the Liberals in the projection. The party is leading in 86 seats and wins an average of 103.2 seats in the projection, an increase of three and 3.6, respectively, since last week. That represents a big loss of seats compared to the 144 the Conservatives won a year ago.

The Bloc Québécois, at 6.3% nationally (27.8% in Quebec), is about where they were a year ago. They are leading in 22 seats and win an average of 19.6 seats in the projection, suggesting little change from April 2025.

For fully interactive charts, tables and maps, head to The Writ’s website:

While it pales in comparison to the number of seat gains the Liberals would make, the biggest proportional gain since a year ago goes to the New Democrats. The party sits at 9.4% (+0.6 since last week), is leading in 15 seats (+5) and projected to win an average of 9.1 seats (+1.3). This puts recognized party status (12 seats) in reach of the NDP, but the party’s expected over-estimation in the polls suggests it might not be as easy as it appears — the NDP is leading in too many toss-ups for all of them to go its way.

The last week of polling has been pretty good for the New Democrats, relatively speaking, but there is also good reason for the NDP not to get too carried away with some of the numbers.

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There’s been reporting on the fears within the Conservative caucus that Pierre Poilievre’s poor polling numbers have put their seats in danger. It’s undoubtedly been one of the factors contributing to the loss of four MPs to the Liberals through floor-crossing, with perhaps more to come. But some MPs are in greater need of a bounce back by the party (and have more reason to be tempted by the life raft of the Liberal benches). Who are they?

As it stands, the Conservatives would likely see their holdings in the House drop significantly if an election were held today. This week’s update to The Writ’s Vote and Seat Projection puts the party ahead in just 83 seats, representing a decrease of 57 seats from the 140 the Conservatives currently hold. Even the party’s Avg. Projection, which takes into account the likelihood that the Conservatives would outperform their polls, would still have the party losing 40 seats.

There’s been little change in the projection since last week. The Liberal lead now stands at 12.4 points in the vote projection (46.3% to 33.9%), with the NDP stuck at 8.8%. The Liberals are projected to be leading in 226 seats, a gain of three since last week that has come equally from the Conservatives, Bloc Québécois (22) and NDP (10).

That things have not deteriorated further for the Conservatives might be a silver lining for the party — but for a lot of MPs, that just means that the party is currently bottoming out at levels that put their own seats on the chopping block.

For fully interactive charts, tables and maps, head to The Writ’s website:

Let’s get to those seats that are most at risk. The Riding Projections classify seats from Safe to Toss. There are a lot of Conservative seats projected to be Liberal Tosses, but those could go either way. Instead, let’s focus on the Conservatives who are in most need of a comeback for their party and are in the greatest danger of losing — even if they beat their polls.

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That being the case, I figured I should update the Vote and Seat Projection Model a day early. Not only will this give us a chance to take a look at what the model says we should expect in the two Toronto ridings of Scarborough Southwest and University—Rosedale and the Quebec riding of Terrebonne, it’ll also give us a baseline against which to judge the results.

Before diving into the numbers, let me take this opportunity to invite you to tune in to our coverage of the byelection results, starting as soon as the polls close at 8:30 PM ET tonight on YouTube!

We’re expecting a bit of a late night. We should be able to get through the two Toronto ridings fairly quickly before turning our attentions to Terrebonne, where a special write-in ballot will delay the count in what is expected to be a closely-contested seat. We might have to stick around until every vote is counted!

By then, though, we should already know if the Liberals get their majority government if the two Toronto seats are called relatively early. But, if the Liberals can take it, Terrebonne will provide them more cushion. Conversely, if the Bloc can win it back, then they will deal Mark Carney his first real setback since the April 2025 election.

Before getting to the byelections, here’s where the latest projection puts things nationally:

The Liberals have slipped 0.4 points in the vote projection and two seats in the seat projection since last week, but otherwise are holding steady with 45.9% of the vote and 223 seats. The Conservatives are up a small 0.3 points to 34.1%, but are unchanged at 84 seats. The Bloc is up one seat to 23, while the NDP is also up one seat to 11 and sits at 8.8% of the vote. That share of the vote is virtually unchanged from last week — and this is after the inclusion of a few polls conducted after Avi Lewis become NDP leader. In short, we’re seeing no Lewis bump just yet.

For fully interactive charts, tables and maps, head to The Writ’s website:

That’s the big picture. What about the three ridings holding byelections today? Below are the results from the last general election, when the Liberals’ Bill Blair won in Scarborough Southwest and Chrystia Freeland prevailed in University—Rosedale. In Terrebonne, Tatiana Auguste defeated the Bloc’s Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné by a single vote, a result that was overturned by the Supreme Court due to an error made by Elections Canada that could’ve impacted the result.

How do these three seats look today, and what benchmarks can we set to help us judge the results?

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While there hasn’t been a significant amount of movement over the last week in the polls, what has occurred has pushed the Liberals above the 220-seat threshold in the projection. They are now projected to be leading in 225 seats in the model, up 10 seats from last week. Most of those gains have taken place in one province: Ontario.

But there’s a caveat.

The Conservatives have dropped down nine to just 84 seats, their lowest level in the projection to date since the last election. The Bloc is unchanged at 22 seats while the NDP is up one to 10.

In the vote projection, the Liberals have ticked up 0.5 points to 46.3%, followed by the Conservatives at 33.8% (-0.3) and the New Democrats at 8.9% (-0.3).

For fully interactive charts, tables and maps, head to The Writ’s website:

But the key number to look at in this week’s update is the Avg. Projection, which takes into account expected over- or under-performance of each party in an actual election. While the Liberals have jumped 10 seats in the number of ridings in which they are projected to be leading, their average projection has only increased by 2.9 seats to 212.1 seats, while the Conservatives have slipped only 2.8 in the average projection to 102.2 seats. What gives?

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The Liberals sit at 45.8% in the vote projection, down only 0.2 points from last week. The party has been sitting around 46% since the beginning of March, a new cruising altitude for the Liberals since rising from around 40% in January. The party is projected to be leading in 215 seats (and averaging 209.2 seat wins when taking into account potential polling and modelling errors), again largely unchanged since the beginning of the month.

While the Liberals have levelled out, it’s not clear that the Conservatives have. They’re down just 0.3 points from last week to 34.1% in the projection, but unlike the Liberals they have been on a steady (if slow) downward trend. With the exception of a few marginal upticks, they’ve been dropping almost every week since January when they were at 38%. This has pushed them down to 93 in the number of seats they are leading in and an average of 105 seat wins.

For fully interactive charts, tables and maps, head to The Writ’s website:

We’ll have to keep an eye on those Conservative numbers. Some polls have suggested that the party might be rebounding, but for every (relatively) good poll we’ve seen for the Conservatives lately there have been some bad ones.

The New Democrats are sitting at 9.2% in the vote projection and 11 seats, but just 8.2 seats on average when taking into account their tendency to under-perform the polls. These numbers are drawn from polling conducted before Avi Lewis’s leadership victory on Sunday but, as we can see from the regional breakdown, the NDP has a lot of work to do.

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The Conservatives stand at 34.4%, with both the Liberals and Conservatives virtually unchanged since last week’s update. The New Democrats, however, are up 1.2 points to 9%.

There’s been little change in the national seat projection, with the Liberals down one seat to 217, the Conservatives up three seats to 94, the Bloc down one to 21 and the NDP down one to nine. The Greens are holding at two.

In the Average Projection, which takes into account potential polling and modelling errors, the Liberals are still above the 200-seat threshold at 208.4. The Conservatives, who are expected to beat their polling, have an average projection of 107.8 — which certainly looks a lot better than being sub-100.

Visit the Vote and Seat Projection pages at The Writ to see all the interactive charts, tables and maps:

While there hasn’t been much movement at the national level, there has been some shifts regionally, the biggest having been in Alberta.

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That’s what The Writ’s new model shows in its inaugural projection. Yes, the vote and seat projection model is finally live!

I’ve been working away at a new model since the last election and, after a flurry of activity over the last few weeks, it is now finally ready to present. A methodological explanation can be found here, if you want to dive into the details. The full national and regional projections can be found here, and full riding projections can be found here.

These will all be best viewed on the website, as the charts are interactive. But let’s take a brief look at some of the topline numbers as this projection is launched.

The Liberals are projected to be leading in 218 seats across the country, a significant increase of 49 seats from the last election. That puts them well over the threshold of 172 seats required for a majority government, hardly a surprise when they are projected to take 46.1% of the vote. The party’s odds of winning a majority if an election where held today are 92%. Their odds of a majority are 95%.

If things are going well for the Liberals, it’s because things are going badly for the Conservatives. They’re down to 34.6% of the vote and just 91 seats, a fall of 53 seats since the last election. The Bloc Québécois is holding at 22 seats, while the New Democrats might be able to take enough advantage of the Conservatives’ weakness to jump to 10 seats with 7.8% of the vote. The Greens, at 2.3%, have a shot at two seats.

Below you’ll see the Vote and Seat Projection table that you’ll find at the top of the Vote and Seat Projections page. Let me take you through how to read it.

In the first column is the Vote Projection. As it is reflects the sum total of all of the riding-level projections in the model, it isn’t a simple polling average (though that is where things start). It’s the best guess at what the result would be in a snap election based on where the polls are today and adjusted for any important dynamics in the 343 ridings across the country.

The next three columns show the Seat Projection with the high and low ranges. The Seat Projection is the number of seats in which each party is projected to be leading, based on the polls and any local riding dynamics (such as the presence or lack thereof of an incumbent or a floor-crosser, to name a few of the factors the model takes into account). The low and high ranges show 95% of all likely outcomes, taking into account potential polling and modelling error. You’ll notice that there is a much bigger gap between the Conservative projection and their high range vs. their low range, and vice versa for the New Democrats. This is not an accident, as the ranges take into account how parties perform in actual elections relative to their polls.

The final column on the right shows the Avg. Projection, which is the result of 10,000 simulations. Like the ranges, this takes into account potential polling and modelling error. The Conservatives often beat their polls; the New Democrats don’t. Accordingly, the Avg. Projection for the Conservatives is 106.6 seats rather than 91, because they are more likely than not to beat their polls and win more of the toss-ups than expected. The NDP Avg. Projection is 6.8 seats, as they are more likely than not to come up short in a few of the races in which they are projected to lead.

How should you read these numbers? The Seat Projection is The Writ’s “official call”, as it shows what the result of an election would be based on where the polls are today — it doesn’t assume the polls and the modelling will be wrong in one direction or another, as they aren’t always wrong in the same direction from one election to the next. But the Avg. Projection should also be taken into consideration, as it gives an indication of where to set expectations. If tomorrow was election day, the New Democrats should win 10 seats with where the polls are. But don’t be surprised if they would win closer to seven.

My plan is to update the model once per week, usually on Tuesdays, with short posts published to go over the changes in the update. But I might post updates more frequently if the need arises. The model would be updated daily during a campaign.

There’s so much more to dig into, as you’ll see if you head over to the website. Tracking data going back to the last election, riding-by-riding projections and full regional breakdowns. Subscribers to The Writ will have more to explore on their own, but let me take you through some of the highlights.

Already a subscriber to The Writ? You can skip ahead to some more charts and analysis below. But if you’re not a subscriber, here’s a little sneak peak of what is behind the curtain at The Writ’s new vote and seat projections: Charts!

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While I’ve been building and running election models for over 15 years and ran the CBC’s Poll Tracker in the 2015, 2019, 2021 and 2025 elections (as well as for a handful of provincial elections), this model is newly-designed from the ground up. I wrote about some of my thought processes during the development of the model here:

The Writ’s vote and seat projection model was launched in March 2026. Prior data was loaded into the model to calculate projections stretching back to the April 2025 election for comparison purposes.

This projection model will always be in a state of evolution as changes will be made when required (and, if significantly changing the model, explained in full). While I’ve taken as many steps as possible to reduce the amount of my own subjective judgment that is applied to the projections, there might arise some situations in which there are few or no historical precedents to use as guidance. In those cases, some ad hoc adjustments to the projection model might be made by me.

Calculating the polling average

National and regional polls are weighted by three factors.

The first is the date of the poll, based on the mid-point of the poll’s field dates. Outside of a campaign, polls with a mid-point date within the last week are given a full weight, while during a campaign full weights are given to polls with a mid-point date within the last three days. Outside of a campaign, the date weight of a poll is reduced by 7% per day, while during a campaign it is reduced by 25% per day.

The second weight is the sample size, with larger sample sizes given more weight than smaller sample sizes, up to a limit of 1,500.1

The third weight is the track record of a polling firm, with polling firms with a better track record give more weight than polls with a worse track record.

The relative weights of these three factors is 70%, 25% and 5%, respectively, with the sample size and track record weight reduced at the same pace as the date weighting. After each poll is assigned a weight, it is then used to calculate an average in a given region. Polling averages are calculated for each region and sub-region, depending on what data is available.

Riding-level projections

For each region with a polling average, a baseline riding projection is calculated for each riding in that region. The riding projection is a 50/50 combination of a proportional and uniform swing model.

With proportional swing, a party’s result in a riding in the previous election is adjusted proportionally by how a party’s support has shifted in the region as a whole since that election.2

With uniform swing, a party’s result in a riding is adjusted uniformly by how a party’s support has shifted in the region as a whole.3

The average between the proportional and uniform swing is then calculated for each party in each riding, and then those numbers are adjusted to ensure support adds up to 100%.

The projection for each riding in each region with a polling average is then assigned a weight according to the weight of all the polls in the polling average for that region, and a weighted average riding projection is then calculated for every riding.

At this point, adjustments are made to the projection to take into account local factors. This include:

• Byelections: When a seat has changed hands in a byelection, the vote projection in the region where and when the byelection was held is used as the new baseline from which to apply the proportional and uniform swing. When a seat hasn’t changed hands, the previous general election result is still used as the baseline. Regardless of whether the riding changed hands or not, the error range for the riding’s projection is widened to increase the level of uncertainty.

• Incumbency: Based on historical precedent, the presence of an incumbent marginally boosts support for the Liberals or NDP, largely at the expense of the other party.4 The lack of an incumbent penalizes the party that lost the incumbent by between three to four points, with different parties getting a corresponding boost depending on which party has lost the incumbent.

• Floor-crossing: The party that has welcomed a floor-crossing MP receives a boost that comes at the expense of the party that lost the floor-crossing MP. The size of that boost can be adjusted according to the circumstances but is based on past precedent.

• Independents: The presence, or departure, of significant Independent MPs or candidates is taken into account.

• Party leaders: A party leader running in a riding for the first time gets a significant boost in the model, based on past precedents. A party whose leader has vacated a riding is penalized to a greater extent than when it is a normal incumbent MP that has retired.

• Candidates with previous electoral experience: New candidates who have previously sat in a provincial or territorial legislature or who were leaders of a provincial or territorial party are awarded a boost which comes at the expense of other parties, depending on the party of the candidate.

• Withdrawn or no candidate: When a major party withdraws a candidate but that candidate will still be present on the ballot as a candidate for that party, a smaller share of what the candidate would have normally been expected to get is awarded to the party. That reduction is awarded to other parties depending on which party withdrew their candidate. When a major party has no candidate on the ballot, the share that would have been projected for a candidate from that party is distributed to other parties in different amounts depending on which party does not have a candidate. When a party did not run a candidate in the last election, previous results are used to estimate that party’s support.

The size of boosts or penalties assessed is determined by looking at how past actual election results compared to expected results when applying the mixed uniform/proportional swing model to those past elections.

Once these adjustments are complete, a final projection for the riding can be calculated. These are the numbers that you can find on the Riding Projections page.

Vote projection

The national, provincial and regional vote projections are calculated by summing the riding projections. In other words, the weighted polling average and the vote projection are two separate things, and only the vote projection is presented.

The projection for each province is calculated by weighting each riding projection by the average of 1) the riding’s share of the province’s total eligible voting population in the last election and 2) the riding’s share of the province’s total actual voters in the last election. With each riding assigned a turnout weight, they can then be combined to calculate the vote projection for the province as a whole.

This means that the vote projection takes into account not only turnout dynamics but also the adjustments made to each individual riding. A party losing a large number of incumbents in a province, for example, would be projected to take less of the vote than the polling average would suggest.

To calculate the national (and, in the case of Atlantic Canada, regional) vote projection, the provincial vote projections are weighted by the share of each province’s national turnout in the last election. Different provinces have consistently and predictably had higher or lower turnout than the country as a whole.5

Since the national vote projection is dependent on the provincial vote projections, single-province or region polls can influence the national vote projection.

Sub-regional vote projections presented with the Riding Projections (such as for Toronto or Montreal) are a simple average of the individual riding projections in that region, with a few exceptions made for regions with ridings with significantly smaller populations or lower turnout.6

Seat projection

The Seat Projection is simply the number of ridings in which a party is projected to be leading.

However, each party in each riding also has a lower and higher range of likely support. These ranges are based on the past performance of this model when applied to elections between 2011 and 2025, meaning the ranges take into account both the errors in the model itself and in the polls. For that reason, the ranges aren’t a simple +/- calculation, with the likelihood of the result being higher or lower than the projection being equal. The precise projection for each riding does not take into account the past errors in the polls, but the projection ranges do take into account past polling error.

This means that parties that have historically beaten their polls (such as the Conservatives) have a higher high range and a lower low range than parties that have historically under-performed their polls (such as the New Democrats). These tendencies to under- or out-perform the polls is calculated for each party in each region. In some regions, for example, parties have largely matched their polls while they haven’t in others. Alberta and Saskatchewan for the Conservatives are good examples of where the polls have been off by greater amounts than in other regions.

These upper and lower ranges are then used to determine which seats are in contention for each party at each confidence level. More seats are in contention at the 95% confidence level, where the ranges are greater, than at the 75% confidence level, where the ranges are smaller.

The classification of a projection as Safe, Likely, Lean, Close, Edge and Toss reflects at which level of confidence does a seat become contested. If a seat is projected as “Safe”, it means that with the widest projected ranges for every party the leading party’s floor is higher than every other party’s ceiling at the 95% confidence level. “Likely” represents the 85% to 95% range, “Lean” the 75% to 85% range, “Close” the 65% to 75% range, “Edge” the 55% to 65% range, and “Toss” is 55% and less.

Since the upper and lower ranges differ for each party, in each region and at each confidence level, the classification of a projection is not uniformly based on the same margins. Two seats contested by the Conservatives and Liberals with the same margin between the two parties might be an “Edge” call in Ontario and a “Lean” call in Alberta because of how the ranges for the two parties differ from region to region. For example, a Liberal lead in Alberta is going to be more uncertain than a Conservative lead of the same size in the province, because the Conservative floor is higher than the Liberals’ floor.

The precise riding projections do not take into account these past polling performances, however, because polling errors are not consistent from one election to the next. Rather than risk adding to potential errors7, I have decided to let the riding projections reflect the seats each party should be able to win based on where the polls are, and let the projection classifications reflect the certainty (or uncertainty) of those projections.

Calculating probabilities and the Avg. Projection

Using the ranges at each confidence level, the number of seats being contested between two or more parties is calculated. Then, a proportion of these contested seats are randomly assigned to each party to give each party a total of seats won. The result is one election simulation that incorporates the uncertainty in the riding projections. This process is repeated 10,000 times to simulate 10,000 individual election results.

The presented “chances of winning” the election is the equivalent of the share of times one party has the most seats and/or crosses the 172-seat threshold for a majority government in those 10,000 simulations.

The high and low seat projection ranges reflect the 95th percentile of outcomes in those 10,000 simulations, while the Avg. Projection is the average outcome of those simulations. As the simulations rely on the projection ranges for each individual riding, which themselves are calculated by assessing the tendency for parties to out- or under-perform their polls and the model, the ranges and the Avg. Projection take into account the likelihood that parties will beat or under-perform their polls and the model.

• Any questions regarding the model? Leave them as a comment below or send me an email.

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