Early voting numbers in New York City surged for the 2026 Midterm Elections this year, jumping 60% compared to the last midterm race four years ago.
In 2022, more than 432,000 people cast their votes during the early voting period., This year, over 690,000 did so, according to numbers from the city’s Board of Elections.
Election Day is Tuesday, with the governor’s race showdown between incumbent Kathy Hochul and GOP challenger Bruce Blakeman at the top of the ballot for those in New York City. Nationally, the question of whether the Democrats can gain control of the House or Senate is the main focus of voters’ attention.
Early voting closed in NYC on Sunday.
“It’s great. Keep voting, 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. And if you see a poll worker say thank you because they’ve been working so hard,” Mayor Mamdani, who has pounded the pavement with Hochul in the final days of her re-election race, said of the early voting numbers on Monday.
The surge could reflect voter enthusiasm and an uptick of registered voters amid broad concern over Donald Trump’s second term as president. It also may be attributed to New Yorkers getting increasingly comfortable with early voting, which was first introduced in 2019.
This year’s numbers are still below last year’s, when New Yorkers headed to the polls for the high-stakes mayoral election between Mamdani and Andrew Cuomo. More than 735,000 people cast their ballots early in 2025.