2026 General Election: November 3, 2026. New info launches early October.
2026
ELECTION
What You Need to Know Before Voting
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Federal
U.S. Senate
All North Carolina voters will see four candidates on the 2026 general election ballot. U.S. Senators serve six-year terms. North Carolina's two sitting Senators are Thom Tillis who is not running for reelection and Ted Budd whose term ends in 2028.
U.S. House of Representatives
U.S. House of Representatives members are elected every two years. Four of North Carolina's 14 Congressional representatives are Democrat and ten are Republican. Thirty-seven candidates are running for the offices across the 14 districts. All of the state's incumbents are running for reelection.
State
N.C. General Assembly
The entire North Carolina state legislature (also known as the General Assembly which includes both N.C. Senate and N.C. House of Representatives) is up for election every two years. Every office will be on the ballot in the general election in November but only a handful are on the ballot during the primary. The key roles of the General Assembly are to determine the state tax rate, determine the state’s budget and create state laws.
N.C. Statewide Judicial Offices
The terms for the N.C. Supreme Court and the N.C. Appeals Court are eight years. They are staggered terms; one of the seven state Supreme Court seats and three of the 15 state Appeals Court are up for election in 2026.
Municipal
Local Government Roles
Local elections in 2026 include a variety of seats for county Boards of Commissioners and Boards of Education.
What is a primary?
A primary election is a “run-off” where contestants from one political party compete with one another. The winner of a primary will be on the ballot for the general election. If there is only one contestant (or no contestants at all) from a political party running, there will not be a primary for that party for that race.
Can anyone vote in a primary?
North Carolina has partisan primaries that are open to unaffiliated voters. Any registered Democratic, Republican or unaffiliated voter can vote in this North Carolina primary. Specifically, registered Republicans and registered Democrats can only vote in their party’s primary. Unaffiliated voters can select which primary they want to vote in. That said, other voters registered with third parties (e.g. Libertarian, Green Party, No Labels) are not eligible to vote in this primary.
Why is voting in primaries important?
In general, voter participation rates for primaries are much lower than for general elections. On average across North Carolina, fewer than 20% of voters voted in the last midterm primary in 2022. When a minority of voters vote, the voice of a community or region is not reflected in results. Furthermore, because certain regions are heavily skewed toward a single political party, the only meaningful choice that voters have to hold elected officials to account is during primaries. Several Mecklenburg County, North Carolina races for instance have no Republican opponents (such as the county sheriff), so those races will be determined by this primary.
Did you know...
The order that candidates appear on the ballot is determined by a bingo machine? A ball with a letter from a bingo machine is selected first, and then a coin is tossed to decide if the candidates are then listed in alphsbetical order or reverse alphabetical order. The letter picked for 2026 was F and the coin toss was tails, which means candidates will appear in reverse alphabetical order.
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