Advance polls drew fewer voters than in previous Ontario elections.
Preliminary figures released by Elections Ontario on Monday show 678,789 eligible voters cast ballots over the three days that advance polling stations were open late last week. That works out to just 6.14 per cent of eligible Ontarians voting early.
It is a drop from the 1,066,545 voters, or 9.92 per cent, who cast ballots in the provincial vote in 2022 and the 698,609 voters, or 6.8 per cent, who voted early in the 2018 Ontario election.
The decline could be attributed to the shorter window for advance voting this time around. Advance polls were only open from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. last Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, while there were ten advance voting days in 2022 and five days in 2018.
“Thank you to all voters who participated in advance voting and to the dedicated staff who worked to keep the voting process in Ontario safe, efficient, and secure," Ontario's Chief Electoral Officer Greg Essensa said in a statement. "If you haven’t cast your ballot yet, there’s still time—visit your local election office or vote on election day.”
There are roughly 10.8 million Ontarians who are eligible to vote in the snap election, according to Elections Ontario.
Voters can still cast an early ballot by going to their local election office until Wednesday.
On election day on Thursday, voting will be open from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.
Voters can find out where their assigned voting location is by entering their postal code in the "voter information service" section at elections.on.ca, downloading the Elections Ontario app or on their Voter Information Card, which was mailed to all registered voters last week.