Data Methodology

ElectioMap publishes election results sourced exclusively from official electoral authorities. This page explains exactly where our data comes from, how often it updates, and how we handle errors and corrections.

Where our data comes from

Primary sources — official government authorities

For every election we cover, our first and preferred source is the official national electoral commission or equivalent government body. These are the authoritative institutions responsible for conducting and certifying elections. Examples include:

• Colombia — Registraduría Nacional del Estado Civil
• Poland — Państwowa Komisja Wyborcza (PKW)
• Armenia — Central Electoral Commission of Armenia
• Kosovo — Komisioni Qendror i Zgjedhjeve (KQZ)
• Hungary — Nemzeti Választási Iroda (NVI)

We link to the official source on each election page so you can verify the figures independently at any time.

Secondary sources — unofficial data, always cross-verified

In rare cases, an official source may not publish machine-readable data or may be temporarily unavailable. When we cannot use an official source, we may draw on reputable journalistic aggregators, major international wire services, or international election-observation bodies. In every such case, we:

1. Cross-verify the figures against at least two independent non-official sources
2. Clearly label the data as coming from a non-official source on the relevant page
3. Replace the data with the official figures as soon as they become available

We never publish figures from a single unofficial source without independent corroboration.

Live election coverage

Update frequency

During an active election count, our automated system fetches the latest results from the official source and updates the map approximately once per minute. This is the fastest interval that avoids placing excessive load on official government servers.

Some official commissions restrict how often their data may be accessed, or publish batched updates less frequently. In those cases, we fetch data as often as the source permits — typically every 2–5 minutes — and display the time of the last successful update on the results page.

What "live" data means

When the official authority certifies the final result, we update the election page to mark it as final. Preliminary figures are never used in historical archives — only certified final results are preserved.

Source unavailability

If the official source becomes temporarily unavailable, we display the last successfully retrieved figures alongside the exact timestamp of that retrieval. We do not interpolate, estimate or fill gaps with projected numbers. The page clearly shows when data was last refreshed.

Historical election data

Historical results are sourced from the official certified final results published by the relevant electoral authority. Where results are expressed as percentages, we record them to exactly two decimal places as published by the source — we do not round, aggregate or adjust figures. Vote totals and seat counts are recorded exactly as certified.

For older elections where the original official source is no longer available online, we use the best available archival record and note the source clearly on the page.

How live data flows to your screen

• Our server polls the official source API or results page on a ~1 minute schedule
• Raw figures are validated against our data schema and stored with an immutable timestamp
• Your browser polls a lightweight manifest file every minute to detect when new data arrives
• Only when the manifest signals new data does your browser fetch the updated results snapshot
• The map and results table update instantly — no page reload needed

Corrections policy

We correct errors as soon as they are identified. Because our live data is fetched directly from official sources, corrections to live figures happen automatically when the source corrects its own data. For historical pages or metadata errors (candidate names, party labels, seat thresholds), corrections are applied manually and, where material, noted on the affected page.

If you spot an error, please contact us — we take data accuracy seriously and will investigate all reports promptly.

Questions about our data?

If you have questions about sources for a specific election, methodology details, or would like to report a discrepancy, please visit our Contact page. You may also find our Editorial Policy useful for understanding how we make coverage decisions.