Georgia's Early Vote Tops 2.8 Million, Up 11% From the Last Midterm
In-person early voting is over: 2,826,388 Georgians have voted early in person or by mail, 11% more than voted early in the 2022 midterm. Here is turnout by county, where early voting grew since 2022, and who voted, by age.
November 2, 2026 · By CivicBubble™
A CivicBubble™ data brief. In-person early voting ended Friday, Oct. 30; mail ballots are still arriving. Figures are from the Secretary of State’s absentee file of Monday, Nov. 2, 2026, 8:12 AM.
Key findings
2,826,388 Georgians have voted early in person or by mail. That’s 11% more than the 2,538,683 who did in the whole 2022 midterm, and mail ballots are still arriving.
A third of registered voters have already voted. 33.8% statewide, from 12.4% in Chattahoochee County to 47.3% in Towns County.
Early in-person voting grew 18% from 2022, but not everywhere. It rose 22% in the 11 metro Atlanta counties and fell in 29 counties, most of them in the southern half of the state.
Most early voters are 55 or older. More than half of registered voters 65 and older have voted, compared with 18% of those under 35.
Bigger than the last midterm
Early voting is now how most Georgians vote. With in-person early voting over, 2,705,113 people voted at an early-voting site and another 121,275 had a mail or electronic ballot accepted, for 2,826,388 in all.
That already tops the last midterm: in 2022, 2,538,683 Georgians voted early in person or by mail. The 2024 presidential election drew more, 4,056,511.
Mail voting is down by half. In 2022, 248,249 Georgians voted by mail or electronic ballot delivery. This year 121,275 have so far, with 34,423 more ballots issued and not yet returned. Even if every one came back, mail voting would stay well below 2022. Mail ballots must reach the county elections office by 7 p.m. on Election Day. Military and overseas voters have a few extra days.
General election | Early in person | By mail or electronic | All early voters | All voters | Share who voted early |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
2022 (midterm) | 2,290,434 | 248,249 | 2,538,683 | 3,958,301 | 64.1% |
2024 (presidential) | 3,770,030 | 286,481 | 4,056,511 | 5,299,880 | 76.5% |
2026 (midterm, so far) | 2,705,113 | 121,275 | 2,826,388 | After Nov. 3 | After Nov. 3 |
A strong finish
Early voting ended with its busiest week. From Monday, Oct. 26, through Friday, Oct. 30, 1,007,110 people voted in person, 37% of all in-person early votes. Friday alone drew 301,897, the biggest day of early voting this year and about 59% more than opening day (190,395 on Tuesday, Oct. 13).
How much of Georgia has voted
We matched early voters to the August 2026 state voter file to see what share of each county’s registered voters have already cast a ballot. Statewide, it’s 33.8%: 2,802,434 of 8,286,783 registered voters.
The highest rates are in Towns (47.3%), Oconee (46.9%), Greene (46.1%) and Fayette (45.2%) counties. Among metro Atlanta’s four largest counties, DeKalb (40.8%) and Cobb (40.5%) lead, followed by Fulton (38.2%) and Gwinnett (35.6%).
Rates run lower in parts of South, West and Northwest Georgia and in two of the state’s larger cities: Augusta’s Richmond County (26.3%) and Savannah’s Chatham County (27.5%). A low early rate doesn’t have to mean low turnout. Both counties leaned more on Election Day in 2022, when 54% of Chatham’s voters and 57% of Richmond’s voted early, compared with 64% statewide.
Georgia’s 15 largest counties by registered voters
County | Registered voters | Voted early | Share voted early | Early in person vs. 2022 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Fulton | 873,467 | 333,953 | 38.2% | +16.1% |
Gwinnett | 663,540 | 235,974 | 35.6% | +32.9% |
DeKalb | 583,544 | 238,219 | 40.8% | +21.5% |
Cobb | 579,581 | 234,518 | 40.5% | +25.5% |
Chatham | 241,047 | 66,168 | 27.5% | +27.3% |
Cherokee | 225,968 | 85,919 | 38.0% | +22.7% |
Clayton | 211,718 | 70,448 | 33.3% | +22.9% |
Henry | 207,975 | 80,584 | 38.7% | +23.0% |
Forsyth | 186,312 | 74,267 | 39.9% | +11.3% |
Hall | 159,922 | 53,618 | 33.5% | +18.0% |
Richmond | 152,951 | 40,176 | 26.3% | +20.4% |
Muscogee | 146,138 | 42,543 | 29.1% | +17.5% |
Paulding | 143,205 | 51,804 | 36.2% | +24.1% |
Houston | 130,700 | 45,325 | 34.7% | +17.3% |
Columbia | 127,463 | 42,136 | 33.1% | +20.2% |
Where early voting grew
We compare early in-person voting because that voting period has ended, while mail ballots are still arriving. Statewide it rose 18%, from 2,290,434 in 2022 to 2,705,113.
The growth was strongest around Atlanta. The 11 metro Atlanta counties were up 22% and accounted for 62% of the statewide increase; the rest of the state was up 14%. Newton (+36%) and Gwinnett (+33%) grew the most of any county by percentage. Outside metro Atlanta, Whitfield (+28.5%), Chatham (+27.3%) and Clarke (+27.0%) also stood out.
In 29 counties, fewer people voted early in person than in 2022, most of them in the southern half of the state. The largest drop by percentage was in Jenkins County (−12.3%). Baker County was unchanged, at 605.
Who voted early, by age
Early voting skews older. Voters 55 and older are 57% of the early voters we matched to the voter file. More than half of registered voters 65 and older have voted, compared with fewer than one in five under 35.
Age | Registered voters | Voted early | Share of age group | Share of early voters |
|---|---|---|---|---|
18–24 | 855,209 | 164,722 | 19.3% | 5.9% |
25–34 | 1,558,955 | 273,694 | 17.6% | 9.8% |
35–44 | 1,422,526 | 329,966 | 23.2% | 11.8% |
45–54 | 1,267,716 | 424,475 | 33.5% | 15.1% |
55–64 | 1,295,808 | 585,382 | 45.2% | 20.9% |
65–74 | 1,064,113 | 588,027 | 55.3% | 21.0% |
75+ | 822,446 | 436,168 | 53.0% | 15.6% |
What comes next
Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 3. Polls are open 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., and anyone in line by 7 p.m. can still vote. Bring a photo ID. On Election Day you vote at your assigned polling place, which you can find on the Secretary of State’s My Voter Page.
For context, in 2022 about 1.42 million Georgians voted on Election Day, 36% of all voters. In 2024 it was 23%.
What this doesn’t tell us
How anyone voted. These are counts of voters, not votes for any candidate.
Final turnout. Election Day votes and late mail ballots are still to come. Early turnout isn’t a forecast.
Anything about 23,954 early voters who aren’t in the August 2026 voter file we used. They count in the statewide totals but not in the county shares or age figures.
Journalists are welcome to use these charts with credit to CivicBubble and a link to this page.
How we did this
2026 figures come from the Georgia Secretary of State’s Voter Absentee File for the Nov. 3 general election (file A-12601), stamped Nov. 2, 2026, 8:12 AM. Despite the name, it covers all early voting: in person, by mail and electronic. We counted voters, not rows: a voter counts once if any of their ballots has status “A.” We haven’t found an official key to the file’s status codes. We read “A” as accepted because every such ballot has a return date, while issued, cancelled, rejected and spoiled ballots carry other codes.
Figures for 2022 and 2024 come from the Secretary of State’s official voter history files, which list everyone who voted and how. Their labels for early and mail voting match the 2026 file’s, except 633 ballots in 2022 labeled simply “Early” or “Absentee,” which we count as early. We left out 2018 because its file names voting methods differently and lists 3,764 voters with no method. Our 2022 count is close to the Secretary of State’s own: it reported 2,288,889 in-person early voters at the close of early voting, compared with 2,290,434 in the voter history file we used. “All voters” counts every voter in the history file, including provisional ballots. One voter in 2022 and one in 2024 have no voting method listed; they count only in “All voters.”
Registered voters are active and inactive voters in the August 2026 state voter file. Early voters were matched to it by voter registration number, and county shares and ages use the voter file’s county and birth year. Age is 2026 minus birth year, since the file lists only the year, so it can be off by one; 10 records with birth year 1800 are left out of the age figures. Daily counts use the return date the file records for each in-person ballot (three carry dates before early voting opened). Year-to-year county changes compare early in-person voters by the county each source lists. The 11 metro Atlanta counties are Cherokee, Clayton, Cobb, DeKalb, Douglas, Fayette, Forsyth, Fulton, Gwinnett, Henry and Rockdale.
Our Oct. 27 early-vote brief looks at early voters by CivicBubble’s party model. And if you want your districts, officials and elections in one place, the free CivicBubble app maps every district tied to your Georgia address. Look Up, Keep Up, Speak Up.
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