Swedes abroad voting in the 2026 election can begin sending their postal ballots on 30 July, opening the first phase of voting ahead of Sweden’s parliamentary election on 13 September. Around 220,000 Swedish citizens living outside the country are eligible to participate, although their actual turnout is expected to be considerably lower.
Postal ballots can be sent from abroad from Thursday, 45 days before election day. They must reach Sweden in time for the final count and cannot be posted from within the country. Swedish citizens abroad will also be able to vote in person at participating embassies and consulates from 20 August at the earliest.
The election will determine the composition of the Riksdag, Sweden’s parliament, while voters inside the country will simultaneously elect municipal and regional councils.
How Swedes abroad can vote in the 2026 election
According to the Swedish Election Authority (Valmyndigheten), voters outside Sweden have two main options.
They can send a postal ballot from abroad beginning on 30 July. The voting materials must be completed in the presence of two witnesses aged over 18, who do not need to be Swedish citizens. The ballot should be posted as early as possible because votes arriving after the count will not be included.
Alternatively, voters can cast an early ballot at a Swedish embassy or consulate. This option will become available from 20 August, although opening dates and hours vary between diplomatic offices. It is not possible to vote abroad on election day itself.
Swedish citizens who have emigrated remain automatically registered on the electoral roll for ten years after leaving the country. After that period, they must notify the Swedish Tax Agency (Skatteverket) to renew their registration. Submitting a valid vote from abroad also restores their registration for another ten years.
Citizens temporarily outside Sweden, including students and people working abroad, can use the same postal voting system.
Why overseas ballots attract attention
Votes from Swedish citizens abroad frequently receive significant attention during close elections. However, their perceived influence is partly a consequence of when they are counted rather than the overall size of the group.
Political scientist Henrik Ekengren Oscarsson of the University of Gothenburg told Sweden Herald that turnout among registered Swedes abroad is normally around 30 percent. He estimates that between 70,000 and 80,000 overseas votes could be cast in 2026.
That number is comparable to the total vote in a smaller Swedish county and substantially below the more than 400,000 people eligible to vote for the first time this year.
Overseas ballots nevertheless become politically visible because many are included in the count conducted after election night. They are counted together with late-arriving early votes cast within Sweden and can therefore affect the allocation of the final parliamentary seats.
In exceptionally close contests, small movements during this count can cause seats to shift between parties and blocs. The process sometimes creates the impression that overseas voters have overturned the election, even when most of the late-counted ballots originated inside Sweden.
Parties compete for expatriate voters
Several parties have increased their campaigning among Swedish communities abroad. The Sweden Democrats (Sverigedemokraterna) have targeted voters living on Spain’s Costa del Sol, while the Moderate Party (Moderaterna) and the Green Party (Miljöpartiet) have campaigned in London.
There is no recent official breakdown showing how overseas Swedes vote because their ballots are not published as a separate electoral category. The latest dedicated survey, conducted in 2014, suggested that the group leaned further to the right than the electorate as a whole. However, overseas citizens form a highly diverse population that includes students, pensioners, professionals and families living in different economic and political environments.
The latest large survey by Statistics Sweden (Statistiska centralbyrån) placed the centre-left opposition ahead of the governing parties. In May, the Social Democrats received an estimated 33.9 percent, followed by the Sweden Democrats on 18.3 percent and the Moderates on 17.3 percent. Almost one in five respondents remained undecided.
The survey also placed the Liberals (Liberalerna), a member of Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson’s governing coalition, at 2.5 percent, below the 4 percent parliamentary threshold. The party’s result could consequently have a greater impact on the balance of power than the overseas vote itself.
A late count in a closely watched election
Sweden’s previous parliamentary election in 2022 produced one of the closest results in the country’s modern democratic history. The four parties behind the Tidö Agreement secured a combined advantage of around 46,000 votes over the Social Democrats, the Left Party, the Centre Party and the Greens.
The narrow result strengthened interest in every category of late-counted ballot. It also encouraged parties to seek support among groups with historically lower turnout, including citizens abroad and first-time voters.
Postal voting from 30 July marks the beginning of the formal electoral process. The overseas ballots are unlikely to decide the election on their own, but they could once again become part of the final shifts in parliamentary seats if the contest on 13 September produces another narrow result.
