CZECH REPUBLIC
Otherwise a Runoff will be held between the top-two candidates on 16th–17th October 2026.
The Czech Senate is the upper chamber of Parliament. It cannot be dissolved, and it is never elected in one go: instead, the 81 districts are split into three groups, and one group votes every two years. In 2026 it is the turn of the 27 districts whose number is divisible by three, running from Cheb (3) in the west to Uherské Hradiště (81) in the south-east, including Prague 1, Prague 5, Prague 9, Brno, Plzeň and Ostrava.
These seats were last decided in 2020, so the senators defending them were chosen under very different political conditions. Most of them belong to the Mayors and Independents (10 of the 27 seats), followed by the Civic Democrats (5), the Christian Democrats (3), TOP 09 and SEN 21 (2 each). The ANO movement of Andrej Babiš, which leads the national government, holds just one of the seats up for election: in single-member run-offs it has long had a hard time, because voters of the other camps tend to unite behind whoever faces it. The Senate therefore remains a counterweight to the government rather than a mirror of it.
The ballot takes place on 9 and 10 October, on the same days as the municipal elections, which is why many voters cast both ballots at once. Five candidates won their seat outright in the first round; in the other districts the two best-placed candidates meet again on 16 and 17 October.
Senators are elected in single-member districts, with one senator per district and a term of six years. Every two years the seats of one third of the districts are up for election, so the chamber is renewed gradually. A vacant seat is filled by a by-election in the district concerned.
Each voter has one vote for one candidate. A candidate who gathers more than half of the valid votes in the first round is elected immediately. If nobody reaches that mark, the two candidates with the most votes advance to a run-off one week later, and the one who then receives more votes wins. Votes from the first round are not carried over, and there is no minimum turnout for the result to count.
Candidates can be put forward by registered parties, movements and coalitions, or run as independents with the signatures of at least 1,000 voters from the district. Candidates must be at least 40 years old, voters at least 18. Many candidates run on joint tickets of several parties; on this page, each person is counted for their own party, and those without one of the listed parties appear as Others or Independents.