{"id":944856,"date":"2026-05-07T23:50:44","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T23:50:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/944856\/"},"modified":"2026-05-07T23:50:44","modified_gmt":"2026-05-07T23:50:44","slug":"local-elections-2026-when-do-polling-stations-close-and-is-there-an-exit-poll","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/944856\/","title":{"rendered":"Local elections 2026: When do polling stations close and is there an exit poll?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/newsletter_we_final_embed_desktop.png\" alt=\"WEST END FINAL\" width=\"158px\" height=\"158px\" class=\"sc-eEbqID ecGikU\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Voters have headed to polling stations in their droves on Thursday, in the biggest set of votes since the general election in 2024.<\/p>\n<p>In last year\u2019s local elections, it was a different story with the Conservatives defending the greatest number of council seats.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/01KR0X8XB6WKXACEZ5EB444GEM.jpg\" width=\"4328\" height=\"2885\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"sc-eqUAAy kRUyJB\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer and his wife Lady Victoria Starmer arrive to cast their votes<\/p>\n<p>PA<\/p>\n<p>In London, there are a total of 1,817 seats up for grabs on Thursday, with Labour again defending the most local authorities at 21.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.standard.co.uk\/news\/politics\/local-elections-london-starmer-labour-farage-reform-polanski-green-b1281253.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Keir Starmer\u2019s party<\/a> is facing challenges from the Greens in inner boroughs and independents in east London.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.standard.co.uk\/news\/politics\/london-local-elections-mayor-hackney-croydon-tower-hamlets-b1281441.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">There are also mayoral election races <\/a>in Croydon, Hackney, Lewisham, Newham and Tower Hamlets in London, and Watford in Hertfordshire, while elections are taking place in the Welsh and Scottish parliaments.<\/p>\n<p><strong>When do polling stations close?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Polling stations are open until 10pm.<\/p>\n<p>However,  as long as you&#8217;ve joined the queue by this time, you&#8217;ll still be allowed to vote.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Will there be exit polls for the local elections?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>No authoritative pollster has announced it is conducting an exit poll for this set of elections<\/p>\n<p>Most have released polls based on national voting intention before polling day. <\/p>\n<p><strong>When will we know the results?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>All of the mayoral elections are counting on Friday May 8 with Hackney and Newham expected to declare at 1pm, Watford at 2pm, Lewisham at 3pm, Croydon at 4pm and Tower Hamlets at possibly around 6pm.<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s a list of the estimated results times for each London borough: <\/p>\n<p>\u2022 Kensington &amp; Chelsea 5am<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 Richmond-upon-Thames 5am<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 Hammersmith &amp; Fulham 5.30am<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 Barking &amp; Dagenham 5pm<\/p>\n<p>\u2022 Kingston-upon-Thames 6pm<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Voters have headed to polling stations in their droves on Thursday, in the biggest set of votes since&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":944857,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7757],"tags":[748,7100,33,393,4884,257,263722,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-944856","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-london","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-councils","10":"tag-elections","11":"tag-england","12":"tag-great-britain","13":"tag-london","14":"tag-polling-stations","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116535979454706377","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/944856","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=944856"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/944856\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/944857"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=944856"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=944856"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=944856"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}