# Next German federal election
The next German federal election will elect the 22nd German Bundestag in spring 2029, and under Article 39(1) of the Basic Law it must fall within the window from Friday 26 January 2029 to Sunday 25 March 2029, because the electoral term of the 21st [Bundestag](https://www.edgepedia.org/bundestag) began with its constitutive session on 25 March 2025.[1](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/bundestagswahlen/2029.html) The Federal Returning Officer's planning page for the election, "Bundestagswahl 2029" (Wahl zum 22. Deutschen Bundestag), states this range directly, and the Bundestag's own calendar of [German elections](https://www.edgepedia.org/elections-in-germany) lists the 2029 federal vote as a spring election on a four-year cycle.[1](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/bundestagswahlen/2029.html) • [2](https://www.bundestag.de/parlament/wahlen/wahltermine) A specific date has not yet been set; the election day must be a Sunday or a public holiday under Section 16 of the Federal Elections Act, and schedulers also try to avoid the main holiday seasons.[1](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/bundestagswahlen/2029.html)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Election | Election of the 22nd German Bundestag, four-year term[1](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/bundestagswahlen/2029.html) • [2](https://www.bundestag.de/parlament/wahlen/wahltermine) |
| Legal date window | 26 January 2029 to 25 March 2029; the term began on 25 March 2025, and a new election must take place 46 to 48 months after the term starts[1](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/bundestagswahlen/2029.html) |
| Election day rules | Must be a Sunday or statutory holiday (Section 16 Federal Elections Act); party delegate assemblies may be held from 26 August 2027 and candidate selection from 26 November 2027[1](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/bundestagswahlen/2029.html) |
| Bundestag size | Fixed at 630 seats in 299 constituencies under the 2023 electoral reform[3](https://www.bundestag.de/parlament/wahlen/wahlrecht-inhalt-975000) |
| Threshold status | 5% threshold applies pending new legislation, with an exemption for national-minority parties; parties below 5% are excluded from seat allocation only if their candidates secured the most first votes in fewer than three constituencies[4](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/en/bundestagswahlen/2025/informationen-waehler/wahlsystem.html) |
| Preceding election | 23 February 2025, an early election with 82.5% turnout, the highest since reunification[5](https://www.bundestag.de/presse/hib/kurzmeldungen-1035368) • [6](https://www.kas.de/documents/252038/33607021/Bundestag%2Belection%2Bin%2BGermany%2Bon%2B23%2BFebruary%2B2025.pdf/eb69598f-0af7-da26-14c2-5b98bcc8a03d?version=3.0) |
| Governing context | CDU/CSU won 208 of 630 seats with 28.6% of the vote in 2025; the government led by the CDU/CSU has said it wants to reverse the 2023 reform[7](https://data.ipu.org/parliament/DE/DE-LC01/election/DE-LC01-E20250223/) • [8](https://www.everycrsreport.com/files/2025-03-19_IN12526_27a9e75d11ba7b8be7a0f2acde3d97fd42a3a78b.pdf) • [9](https://doi.org/10.1080/09644008.2026.2671880) |
## Timing and legal framework
The fixed window follows from the Basic Law's rule that a new election takes place at the earliest 46 and at the latest 48 months after the start of the current electoral term. Because the 21st Bundestag constituted itself on 25 March 2025, the 2029 election must be held between 26 January 2029 and 25 March 2029.[1](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/bundestagswahlen/2029.html) If a term ends early, the deadline is instead 60 days after the dissolution decision, as happened for the 2025 election.[1](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/bundestagswahlen/2029.html)
The timetable for parties starts well before election year. Regardless of the final date, party delegate assemblies that nominate candidates may take place at the earliest 29 months after the term begins, that is from 26 August 2027, and the selection of candidates themselves may begin 32 months after the term begins, from 26 November 2027, under Section 21(3) of the Federal Elections Act.[1](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/bundestagswahlen/2029.html)
## The current term: the 2025 early election
The 21st Bundestag was elected in an early election on 23 February 2025, more than six months before the normal end of the term. The governing coalition of the SPD, the Greens, and the FDP broke apart on 6 November 2024; Chancellor [Olaf Scholz](https://www.edgepedia.org/olaf-scholz) then put the question of confidence to the Bundestag on 16 December and, as intended, failed to win a majority. He asked Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier to dissolve the Bundestag, who announced the dissolution and set 23 February 2025 as the election date on 27 December 2024, after the SPD and Union parliamentary group leaders had already agreed on that date.[5](https://www.bundestag.de/presse/hib/kurzmeldungen-1035368) Under Article 68 of the Basic Law, the Federal President may dissolve the Bundestag within 21 days of a lost confidence vote, on the Chancellor's proposal, and the new election must then be held within 60 days.[5](https://www.bundestag.de/presse/hib/kurzmeldungen-1035368)
CDU/CSU, led by [Friedrich Merz](https://www.edgepedia.org/friedrich-merz), finished first with 28.6% of the vote and 208 seats in the 630-member chamber.[8](https://www.everycrsreport.com/files/2025-03-19_IN12526_27a9e75d11ba7b8be7a0f2acde3d97fd42a3a78b.pdf) • [7](https://data.ipu.org/parliament/DE/DE-LC01/election/DE-LC01-E20250223/) Turnout rose for the fourth consecutive federal election to 82.5%, the highest figure since [German reunification](https://www.edgepedia.org/german-reunification).[6](https://www.kas.de/documents/252038/33607021/Bundestag%2Belection%2Bin%2BGermany%2Bon%2B23%2BFebruary%2B2025.pdf/eb69598f-0af7-da26-14c2-5b98bcc8a03d?version=3.0)
## Electoral system that will apply in 2029
The Bundestag is elected by personalized proportional representation. Each voter casts two votes: a first vote for a constituency candidate and a second vote for a party's Land list, and the second vote determines how many seats a party receives. Seats are distributed using the Sainte-Laguë/Schepers (formula dividing seats among parties proportionally to votes) method.[4](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/en/bundestagswahlen/2025/informationen-waehler/wahlsystem.html)
The system was reshaped by the Federal Elections Act of June 2023, passed under the SPD, Greens, and FDP coalition. Its aims were to shrink the Bundestag and make its size predictable: the legal standard size had been 598, but overhang and compensatory seats had pushed the chamber to 736 members after the 2021 election, so the new law caps it at 630 while keeping 299 constituencies.[3](https://www.bundestag.de/parlament/wahlen/wahlrecht-inhalt-975000) The 2023 law also abolished overhang and compensatory seats entirely and introduced the **second-vote coverage** procedure: a constituency winner now obtains a seat only if the party's second-vote total in that Land covers the seat, and a constituency can otherwise remain vacant. Independent candidates who win a constituency's relative majority still take the seat directly.[3](https://www.bundestag.de/parlament/wahlen/wahlrecht-inhalt-975000) • [4](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/en/bundestagswahlen/2025/informationen-waehler/wahlsystem.html)
**The 5 percent threshold.** Under the provisional rule, parties with at least 5% of valid second votes nationwide take part in the distribution of seats, with exceptions for parties of national minorities and, until new legislation is enacted, for parties whose candidates secured the most first votes in at least three constituencies.[3](https://www.bundestag.de/parlament/wahlen/wahlrecht-inhalt-975000) • [4](https://bundeswahlleiterin.de/en/bundestagswahlen/2025/informationen-waehler/wahlsystem.html) • [11](https://www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/SharedDocs/Pressemitteilungen/DE/2024/bvg24-064.html) The 2023 law also removed the former basic-mandate clause, under which a party below 5% nevertheless entered the Bundestag if it won at least three constituency seats; that clause had let Die Linke take 39 seats in 2021 on 4.9% of second votes because of its three direct mandates.[3](https://www.bundestag.de/parlament/wahlen/wahlrecht-inhalt-975000)
In its judgment of 30 July 2024 the Federal Constitutional Court largely upheld the reform, including the second-vote coverage system, but declared the 5% restrictive clause, as designed, incompatible with the Basic Law: it is not necessary, for the functioning of the Bundestag, to exclude a party whose members would form a joint parliamentary group with another party's members if the two together cleared 5%, a situation currently applying only to the CDU/CSU grouping.[3](https://www.bundestag.de/parlament/wahlen/wahlrecht-inhalt-975000) Because the 2025 election was near, the Court ordered the clause to continue applying provisionally, but only so that parties below 5% are excluded if their candidates won the most first votes in fewer than three constituencies; this in effect revives the old basic-mandate clause until the legislator acts.[3](https://www.bundestag.de/parlament/wahlen/wahlrecht-inhalt-975000) • [4](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/en/bundestagswahlen/2025/informationen-waehler/wahlsystem.html) The Bundestag has referred to that judgment in holding that applying the 5% threshold in the 2025 election was not objectionable.[10](https://www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/SharedDocs/Pressemitteilungen/EN/2026/bvg26-051.html?nn=68080)
## Prospective changes to the 2029 rules
The legal framework for 2029 may still change. The government formed in 2025 under CDU/CSU leadership has stated its intention to reverse the 2023 reform; Merz said before the 2025 election that "this kind of electoral law harms our democracy."[9](https://doi.org/10.1080/09644008.2026.2671880) The legislator is also obliged to cure the constitutional defect the Court identified in the 5% threshold, either by allowing cooperating parties to be counted together or through other modifications such as lowering, regionalizing, or softening the clause with an alternative access route like the former basic-mandate clause.[3](https://www.bundestag.de/parlament/wahlen/wahlrecht-inhalt-975000)
Electoral scrutiny has drawn Court attention during the current term. The Second Senate noted in August 2025 that it was not apparent why the 21st Bundestag, which only elected its committee for the scrutiny of elections on 26 June 2025, had not promptly begun scrutiny after its constituent meeting; in an order of 23 July 2026 it dismissed an electoral complaint challenging the 5% threshold, because the Bundestag had not yet decided the underlying application, while emphasizing that the Bundestag must conduct electoral scrutiny in a manner capable of achieving its purpose in both timing and substance under Article 41(1) of the Basic Law.[10](https://www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/SharedDocs/Pressemitteilungen/EN/2026/bvg26-051.html?nn=68080)
## Political context
The Bundestag's published calendar places the 2029 federal election in the same spring as the [European Parliament](https://www.edgepedia.org/european-parliament) election and several state elections in Saxony, Thuringia, and [Brandenburg](https://www.edgepedia.org/brandenburg).[2](https://www.bundestag.de/parlament/wahlen/wahltermine) Commentators following the current term describe pressure on the system's stability: the 2023 reform was the fourth change to the federal electoral system since 2011, and the 2025 government's plan to reverse it keeps the electoral rules themselves an object of partisan contest.[9](https://doi.org/10.1080/09644008.2026.2671880)
## References
1. [Bundestagswahl 2029 – Die Bundeswahlleiterin](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/bundestagswahlen/2029.html)
2. [Wahltermine in Deutschland – Deutscher Bundestag](https://www.bundestag.de/parlament/wahlen/wahltermine)
3. [Das geltende Wahlrecht nach der Reform 2023 – Deutscher Bundestag](https://www.bundestag.de/parlament/wahlen/wahlrecht-inhalt-975000)
4. [The Electoral system – The Federal Returning Officer](https://www.bundeswahlleiterin.de/en/bundestagswahlen/2025/informationen-waehler/wahlsystem.html)
5. [Steinmeier verkündet Auflösung des Bundestags und Neuwahlen – Deutscher Bundestag](https://www.bundestag.de/presse/hib/kurzmeldungen-1035368)
6. [The federal election in Germany on 23 February 2025 – Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung](https://www.kas.de/documents/252038/33607021/Bundestag%2Belection%2Bin%2BGermany%2Bon%2B23%2BFebruary%2B2025.pdf/eb69598f-0af7-da26-14c2-5b98bcc8a03d?version=3.0)
7. [Germany – German Bundestag February 2025 Election, IPU Parline](https://data.ipu.org/parliament/DE/DE-LC01/election/DE-LC01-E20250223/)
8. [Congressional Research Service report on the German government formation, March 2025](https://www.everycrsreport.com/files/2025-03-19_IN12526_27a9e75d11ba7b8be7a0f2acde3d97fd42a3a78b.pdf)
9. ['Stroke of Genius' or 'Attack on Democracy'? The 2023 Reform of the German Electoral System, German Politics](https://doi.org/10.1080/09644008.2026.2671880)
10. [Federal Constitutional Court, Press Release No. 51/2026, 6 August 2026](https://www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/SharedDocs/Pressemitteilungen/EN/2026/bvg26-051.html?nn=68080)
11. [Das Bundeswahlgesetz 2023 ist überwiegend verfassungsgemäß, allein die 5 %-Sperrklausel ist derzeit verfassungswidrig, gilt aber mit bestimmten Maßgaben fort](https://www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/SharedDocs/Pressemitteilungen/DE/2024/bvg24-064.html)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Society and history › Politics and government › Elections and representation › Elections and referendums › National and subnational elections outside the US and UK › European elections outside the UK › German national elections*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license