In addition to the Estonian and EU citizens, stateless persons living in Estonia with a long-term residence permit or the right of permanent residence also have the right to vote.

Voters must be at least 16 years of age and their registered address in the population register must be in the relevant rural municipality or city.

Internet voting starts at 9 a.m. on Monday (October 13), and is open around the clock until 8 p.m. on Saturday (October 18).

From Monday to Thursday, advance voting at polling stations in municipalities and cities takes place from 12 noon to 8 p.m. All 356 polling places are open from Friday to Sunday. 

Voters can elect the council of the city or rural municipality that is their place of residence according to the Population Register as of September 19.

On election day (October 19), voting only takes place at polling stations, where you can also change your e-vote if necessary.

On the election day, all polling places are open from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. After voting ends at 8 p.m., the counting of both paper ballots and e-votes begins.

Voting results will be published on the website www.valimised.ee and in the media.

ERR News is republishing information about how and who can vote from the Electoral Commission below.

Voting at a polling station

To vote at a polling station, you need to bring a valid identity document; you cannot yet verify your identity by using the eesti.ee app at a polling place.

You can see a map of polling stations across Estonia here.

How do I vote?

To vote online, a voter needs to download the voter application to their computer from the website www.valimised.ee.

The application is published on the opening page immediately before voting starts.

The voter needs a computer with an internet connection, and for identification, an ID card and an ID-card reader, or their mobile-ID or Smart-ID and PIN codes. Smart devices cannot be used for voting.

You can read more about online voting here.

Vote verification

Within 15 minutes after casting an online ballot, voters can see for themselves that their vote has reached the central election server and correctly expresses the will of the voter.

To do this, they need to download the 'EH kontrollrakendus' (IV verification application) to their phone from Google Play or App Store, or update the application to get the latest version.

The voter application works on computers running Windows, macOS, and Linux operating systems, and the individual verification application works on smart devices running iOS and Android operating systems. 

Changing a vote

If a voter feels that the privacy of their e-vote was not guaranteed at the time of voting or that they were pressured, they have the option to change their choice by either voting again online or voting by paper ballot at a polling station.

If a voter has voted both electronically and by paper ballot, only the vote cast at the polling station will be taken into account.

You can also change your e-vote by voting by paper ballot at a polling place on the election day on Sunday.

If a voter goes to a polling place to change their e-vote, the polling station employee will inform the voter that they have already voted online.

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