Turnout: 85.89%
About this election
The 2015 Danish general election, held on 18 June 2015, chose the 179 members of the Folketing. It produced one of the most paradoxical results in modern Danish history: the Social Democrats of Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt won the most seats of any single party, yet lost power, because the right-wing "blue bloc" together secured a parliamentary majority. The night's sensation was the surge of the populist, Eurosceptic Danish People's Party (DF), which became the second-largest party in the country and the largest within the winning bloc.
Denmark elects its parliament by one of the most precisely proportional systems in the world. Of the 179 seats, 175 are filled in Denmark proper and two each are reserved for the Faroe Islands and Greenland. In Denmark proper, 135 constituency seats are distributed across ten multi-member constituencies and then topped up by 40 compensatory "levelling" seats (tillægsmandater) that correct any disproportionality, so a party clearing the 2% national threshold wins almost exactly its share of seats. Governments are formed by whichever bloc can command a majority — or, more often, avoid a majority against it — and minority governments supported by other parties are the Danish norm.
The campaign was dominated by immigration, the economy's recovery from the financial crisis, and the future of the welfare state. Thorning-Schmidt's centre-left government had stabilised the economy but governed without a majority and had drifted rightwards on asylum. Lars Løkke Rasmussen's Venstre led the opposition but was dogged by an expenses controversy, which allowed the Danish People's Party, campaigning on tighter border controls and protection of welfare for Danes, to capture much of the right's momentum.
The Social Democrats took 26.28% and 47 seats, remaining the single largest party. But the Danish People's Party soared to 21.08% and 37 seats — its best result ever — pushing Venstre into third on 19.47% and 34 seats, its worst showing in over a decade. The Red–Green Alliance (14), Liberal Alliance (13), the brand-new green party The Alternative (9 at its first election), the Social Liberals (8), the Socialist People's Party (7) and the Conservatives (6) filled out the chamber. The blue bloc's combined majority, despite Venstre's slump, sealed the change of government.
Turnout was 85.89%, typically high by international standards. The Social Democrats led the vote in every region of the country, drawing on their traditional strength among working-class and provincial voters, while the Danish People's Party ran strongest outside the capital and Venstre held its rural and Jutland heartland. The map above shows the leading party by region; click any region for the full breakdown.
Despite the Danish People's Party's triumph, its leader Kristian Thulesen Dahl chose to support rather than join the government. Lars Løkke Rasmussen formed a narrow single-party Venstre minority government — one of the smallest in Danish history, holding only 34 of 179 seats — reliant on the DF, Liberal Alliance and Conservatives for its majority. The arrangement set the stage for the December 2015 referendum on Denmark's EU justice opt-out and for years of bloc-based bargaining.
Official results from Statistics Denmark (Danmarks Statistik) — dst.dk/valg. The regional map is built from the agency's results by municipality, aggregated to the five regions.
Compiled and reviewed by Bartłomiej Paruzel, Election Data Analyst, from official results. See our data methodology.