Brazil's 2026 presidential election is entering its first round of voting, with incumbent President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva facing right-wing candidate Flávio Bolsonaro. Vote counting results are being updated.
Brazil's president is elected directly: each voter's ballot carries equal weight, and there is no electoral college. If no candidate wins more than 50% of valid votes in the first round, a runoff will be held three weeks later between the two top vote-getters.
According to opinion polls, two candidates are leading. The first is incumbent President Lula, 80, a veteran figure of the Brazilian left who has served three terms. During his first two terms, from 2003 to 2011, he was credited with steering a historic period of commodity-driven growth and poverty reduction.
Brazilian presidents are limited to two consecutive terms, so if he wins this time, he will not be able to run in 2030. In 2018, Lula was jailed on corruption charges, although his convictions were annulled after 580 days behind bars.
Lula's main rival is far-right candidate Flávio Bolsonaro, the son of Jair Bolsonaro, who is currently serving a prison sentence. Flávio is a 45-year-old lawyer and former senator from Rio de Janeiro. The elder Bolsonaro is serving a 27-year sentence for masterminding a failed coup after losing the 2022 election, but has endorsed his son's campaign and hopes to regain his freedom if his son is elected.
Opinion polls show no other candidate is close to the two front-runners, but there is also no clear leader in polls for the October 25 runoff. The new leader will take office on January 5, 2027.
One of the most important states to watch is Minas Gerais, a mountainous mining and agricultural region larger than France with 21 million people, and Brazil's bellwether state. Since democracy was restored in the 1980s, no candidate has won the presidency without winning Minas. In 2018, Jair Bolsonaro defeated Lula's candidate in the state by more than 1.7 million votes and won the presidency.
Four years later, Lula reclaimed the state by fewer than 50,000 votes and also won the national race. History shows that whoever wins Minas wins the election.
