What time is the exit poll? Everything you need - including how accurate it is

On Thursday, polling stations will be open all day, from morning until night, allowing people to vote for who they want to represent them in Parliament.

For weeks, ever since Prime Minister Rishi Sunak declared the July 4 election from a wet Downing Street back in May, polls have been forecasting a big victory for the Labour party.

However, on election day, the most reliable survey is the exit poll, which has been gaining accuracy in recent years.

Here is all the information you need.

When Is The Exit Poll?

One of the most urgent questions to address, and the one that has the most straightforward solution.

The results of the survey will be released shortly after 10pm.

Exit Polls: What Are They?

Researchers from Ipsos Mori go to 144 different places where people are voting in the UK. They ask many people to fill out a fake voting paper in private, which helps them understand how people have voted.

False voting forms and containers are utilized to "enhance the secrecy of individuals' ballots," as stated by electoral analyst Sir John Curtice.

Employees from the survey organization typically visit the same places during every national election. These locations have been selected to accurately reflect the demographics of the country, including a mix of rural and urban seats, with a slight emphasis on areas that are considered to be closely contested.

Sir John described how they try to revisit the same locations as before whenever they can. The exit poll works by comparing the current results from selected polling stations with the results from the previous exit poll.

Regarding why we use a ballot paper and box, he explained: "If you ask people to speak with an interviewer, they might be hesitant to do so. Therefore, we are trying to reduce the number of refusals, as this is always a problem."

According to Sir John, a "systematic sample" is when a certain number of people are approached at a polling station. The size of these samples can differ depending on the number of registered voters in a specific area.

Are They Really Accurate?

They have improved over time.

The initial prediction in 1974 anticipated that Labour would win by 132 seats. However, the actual result was a difference of only three seats.

Professor John from Strathclyde University in Glasgow mentioned that the predictions have generally been right, although not always perfect. In some cases, the predictions have been more accurate than the opinion polls.

I'm not saying it will definitely happen again this time, but in the past, like in 2015 and 2017, the exit polls have turned out to be more accurate.

The survey from 2015 was more precise than the polls at that time, defying the expectations by accurately predicting that the Conservatives would win the most seats in the election. However, it did not anticipate that they would secure a majority of 11 seats.

After two years, the initial poll results once again indicated that the Conservatives would have the most seats in Parliament, but did not explicitly predict a situation where no single party would have a majority.

In the previous election in 2019, the prediction was for a Conservative win with a majority of 86 seats. This was almost exact, as the final result was a victory with an 80-seat margin.