Table of contents

About the May 2025  local elections

In 2025 there were elections for a total of 23 local authorities across England. These were made up of 14 county councils, eight unitary authorities, and one metropolitan district. In addition, there were six mayoral elections (four combined authority, and two local council), and a parliamentary by-election in Runcorn and Helsby.

Download the Local Elections Handbook 2025 and the dataset below for figures and analysis of the May 2025 local elections results.

Documents to download

About the Local Elections Handbook 2025

Colin Rallings, Michael Thrasher and Hannah Bunting, co-directors of the Elections Centre, which has recently relocated to the University of Exeter, have published their Local Elections Handbook 2025 in collaboration with the Commons Library. Along with the handbook containing figures and analysis of the May 2025 local elections results, the authors have also released a comprehensive dataset.

In the dataset you will find and be able to analyse voting results across all English electoral districts and wards which held elections, including ward voting turnout, number of vacancies per ward, candidate party affiliation, votes collected per candidate, final outcomes for wards and candidates, and more.

The dataset also presents results for parties and their candidates and can be used to further examine party success in individual districts. The data was sourced from local authority websites and through correspondence with local authorities by the House of Commons Library.

This work follows on from the publication of the Local Elections Handbook and dataset for the 2024 local elections, the Local Elections Handbook and dataset for the 2023 local elections, the Local Elections Handbook and dataset for the 2022 local elections and Local Elections Handbook and dataset for the 2021 local elections.

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