Electoral System

Updated April 2026 · reflects the 2022 amendments to Law No. 2839 (Law No. 7393).

Türkiye holds parliamentary and presidential elections under a mixed framework: deputies are elected by closed-list proportional representation in multi-member districts, and the President is elected by absolute majority through a two-round system. Both contests take place on the same day every five years, organised and supervised end-to-end by the Supreme Election Council (YSK).

Constitutional and statutory basis

The principal sources of Turkish electoral law are:

• Constitution of Türkiye (1982, as amended) — especially Articles 67 (right to vote), 75–77 (TBMM and elections), 79 (YSK), and 101 (presidential election).
• Law No. 298 on Basic Provisions on Elections and Voter Registers (1961) — general election procedure, ballot, counting, observation.
• Law No. 2839 on Election of Members of Parliament (1983) — districts, threshold, seat allocation.
• Law No. 2820 on Political Parties (1983) — party formation, finance, dissolution.
• Law No. 6271 on the Election of the President (2012) — nomination, ballot, runoff.

The right to vote

Every Turkish citizen aged 18 or over has the right to vote (Constitution, Art. 67). The right may not be exercised by:

• privates and corporals serving in the Turkish Armed Forces;
• students attending military schools;
• persons serving prison sentences for intentional crimes (those held in pre-trial detention or serving sentences for unintentional crimes retain the right).

Parliamentary elections

Districts

For parliamentary elections, Türkiye is divided into multi-member districts. Each province (il) returning seven or fewer deputies forms a single district; provinces returning more than seven are subdivided. The total number of districts is recalculated before each election by the YSK on the basis of the population register; in the most recent elections of May 2023 the country was divided into 87 districts (YSK Decision 2023/224).

The 7 % national threshold

A party (or alliance, in aggregate) must obtain at least 7 % of the valid votes cast nationwide to be eligible to receive seats in the Grand National Assembly. The threshold was lowered from 10 % by Law No. 7393 of 31 March 2022, which also altered alliance rules so that, when distributing seats among the parties of an alliance, each party’s individual vote in the district is used rather than the alliance total.

Seat allocation

Eligible parties’ seats are distributed within each district by the D’Hondt method. Lists are closed: voters choose a party, not individual candidates. Independent candidates appear separately on the ballot and are elected if they obtain at least one D’Hondt quotient in the district.

Standing for election

To register to contest a parliamentary election, a party must:

• have completed organisation in at least half of the provinces (41 of 81);
• within those provinces, have completed organisation in at least one-third of districts;
• have held its grand congress (büyük kongre) at least six months before the election.

Presidential elections

Eligibility of candidates

• Turkish citizen aged at least 40.
• Has completed higher education.
• Is eligible to be elected as a deputy.

Nomination

Candidates may be nominated by political parties that, individually or in alliance, received at least 5 % of the valid votes in the previous parliamentary election, or by collecting one hundred thousand certified signatures from voters (Constitution, Art. 101).

Ballot

A candidate is elected if they receive an absolute majority (more than 50 %) of valid votes in the first round. If no candidate reaches an absolute majority, a runoff is held on the second Sunday following the first ballot, between the two candidates with the highest vote totals. The candidate receiving the higher vote in the runoff is elected.

Election day procedure

Polls are open simultaneously across the country. Voters present an identity document, receive a stamped ballot in a sealed envelope (or two ballots in concurrent presidential and parliamentary elections), and cast it in a curtained booth before depositing it in a transparent box. Counting takes place at each polling station in public, immediately after the close of polls; results are recorded on numbered tally sheets (tutanak) signed by the polling-station committee, observers, and party representatives.

Recent and upcoming elections