Canada General election15 Oct 2029in 1,071 days Liberal majority 99% No majority 1% Calendar Track record Research
Closest

Is the NDP on 8 per cent or 14? It depends which pollster you ask

Liaison and Nanos have the NDP on 13.6 to 14 per cent; Abacus and Léger on 8 to 9. At 8 the party would hold a handful of seats; at 14 it starts to win back some it lost in 2025.

Written in house from our poll data and our forecast.

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The pollsters agree on the big picture: the Liberals lead the Conservatives by about 15 points. They disagree about the NDP, by more than the usual margin of error.

  • Liaison Strategies (18 to 31 October): 14 per cent
  • Nanos Research (30 October): 13.6
  • Abacus Data (21 October): 9
  • Léger (12 October): 8

That is a gap of 5 to 6 points, and it has lasted. Both Liaison and Nanos have put the NDP higher than other pollsters for months. We have written about it before: at past elections Nanos's NDP figure ran above the result.

Why it matters for seats

Our average puts the NDP on 11.1 per cent and gives it 11 seats. The party's vote is concentrated in a few dozen seats. Within that range of 8 to 14 per cent, small changes decide whether it keeps the seats it has, or wins back some of those it lost in 2025.

The split matters for the Liberals too. Much of the NDP's lost vote went to them. If Liaison and Nanos are right, some of it is drifting back; if Abacus and Léger are right, it is not.

Who has been closer

At the 2025 election the final polls overstated the NDP, and the pollsters with the highest figures were furthest out. But a year and a half from that election, the gap could also be real movement that some methods pick up sooner than others.

Every poll, with each pollster's usual difference from the rest, is on our poll check.

Polling Forecast reads every poll in ten countries, corrects for how pollsters have missed before, and turns them into seats. Our forecasts, the polls and our methods are free to explore.

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