Methodology
How The Margin turns public polls into seat projections — in plain English. Everything here is a nowcast: what current polling implies if an election were held now, not a prediction of a future result.
Poll averages
For each country we collect recent public polls and take a recency-weighted average (newer polls count more, via an exponential half-life), with a light pull toward larger samples. The headline figure is that average, not any single poll.
Uniform national swing (UK, Canada)
We take each constituency's result at the last election and shift every party by the change in its national vote share since then, then call the winner of each seat. Transparent, fast, and the standard first-order model — but it does not capture local candidates or region-specific trends.
Germany — proportional (Sainte-Laguë)
The 2025-reform Bundestag is allocated strictly in proportion to party second votes. We apply the 5% threshold, then distribute all 630 seats by the Sainte-Laguë method. The constituency map swings each Wahlkreis's 2025 second vote by the national movement to show the leading party locally.
Italy — Rosatellum (mixed)
Roughly a third of seats are single-member districts won by the leading coalition; the rest are proportional to party lists above 3%. We allocate the proportional seats by largest remainder and the single-member seats to the plurality coalition, and the district map swings each 2022 collegio by the national coalition movement.
France — two rounds
France elects deputies over two rounds with tactical withdrawals, so a national poll cannot be turned into a reliable seat count. We show the projected first-round leader in every circonscription (its 2024 first round swung by the national movement) and do not put a single seat number on it.
Australia — two-party-preferred
The House tracks the two-party-preferred (2PP) vote. We swing every classic seat by the national 2PP movement off the 2025 pendulum and hold the crossbench (teal independents, Greens) seats, which a 2PP poll doesn't measure.
What 'if held now' means
Projections assume an election today with current polling — no campaign, no events, no turnout model. They move as the polls move. Treat the numbers as estimates with real uncertainty, not destiny.
Sources are cited on each country page. Spotted an error? It matters to us — the model and data are open.