How many days until Election Day (US)?

US Election Day is the Tuesday after the first Monday of November, a formula Congress adopted in 1845 for choosing presidential electors and later extended to the House (1872) and Senate (1914). The 'after the first Monday' wording keeps the election off November 1, All Saints' Day and the day merchants once closed their monthly books, and Tuesday gave 19th-century farmers a travel day after Sunday. The result is a date that moves between November 2 and 8: Tuesday November 3, 2026 for the midterms, when all 435 House seats, 33 regular Senate seats plus special elections, and 36 governorships are decided; and Tuesday November 7, 2028 for the next presidential election.

The countdown is really a chain of earlier deadlines. Voter-registration cut-offs range from about 30 days before (October 5 or 6, 2026 in many states) to same-day registration in roughly 20 states plus DC. Early in-person voting typically opens two to three weeks ahead, mail-ballot request deadlines cluster about a week before, and postmark or receipt rules for returning them vary by state. Polls generally open between 6 and 7 am and close between 7 and 9 pm local time. Election Day is not a federal holiday; around a dozen states including New York and Illinois make it a state holiday, and about 30 states require employers to give time off to vote, often paid.

Odd-year dates in the table are smaller elections but still real ones: November 2, 2027 brings governor races in Kentucky, Louisiana and Mississippi plus many city councils and school boards, and November 6, 2029 has the Virginia and New Jersey governorships. If you are following the presidential race, the primaries start in early 2028 and the winner is inaugurated on January 20, 2029, so the countdown to Election Day 2028 is only the countdown to the vote, not to the change of office.