Voting starts in General Election 2024 with millions expected to cast ballot

Voting has started in the 2024 General Election election with nearly 3.7 million eligible to cast a vote today.

Following a short and snappy three-week campaign, polling stations across the country opened from 7am this Friday morning and will remain open until 10pm this evening.

Voters must go to the polling station they are registered in to cast their vote. This is stated on your polling card. If you have not received a polling card, you can check where you have to go to vote on ChecktheRegister.ie.

READ MORE: Who should I vote for in the general election? A rundown of the main parties

READ MORE: Join the Irish Mirror's General election results and top stories group on WhatsApp

People are also encouraged to bring photo ID.

Ireland uses the proportional representation single transferable vote system (PR-STV) in our elections.

You mark a “1” in the box beside your first-choice candidate. You can then continue to mark the ballot paper in your order of preference (2, 3, 4 etc).

You can use as many or as few votes as you want. You do not have to vote for all candidates. If there are candidates that you absolutely do not want to see elected, do not put a number beside their name.

You can only have one first-preference vote and putting more than one “1” on your ballot paper will spoil your vote.

Do not write anything else on the ballot paper or else your vote will be considered spoilt.

Join our General Election 2024 results service on WhatsApp

Click on this link to join the Irish Mirror's General Election 2024 results and top stories service on WhatsApp. You can expect election constituency results and big election stories direct to your phone. You can leave our group at any time if you don't like it

There are 686 candidates running in Election 2024. Of them, 246 are women. This marks a 50% increase since the 2020 election, largely driven by the new 40% gender quota imposed on political parties.

Sinn Féin is running 71 candidates, Fine Gael is running 80 and Fianna Fáil has 82.

Some 174 TDs will be elected in 43 constituencies, and a majority of 88 politicians is required to form a government.

The Dáil will sit for the first time on December 18, but there are already doubts that a government will be formed on this day.

Counting in General Election 2024 will start at 9am on Saturday and is expected to continue until at least Sunday.

The Irish Mirror will be keeping you up to date throughout the weekend.

Join the Irish Mirror's General Election 2024 WhatsApp group here to get live election results and updates. You can leave the group at any time if you don't like it.