Local & European Elections

When the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government announces that the Government has agreed European Parliament or Local Elections will be held to be entitled to vote your name must be included on the Register of Electors.

How to register to vote

Each local authority is legally obliged to maintain, update and publish its Register of Electors. The Register must be maintained and updated on an ongoing basis.

To be eligible for inclusion in the Register of Electors, you must:

• Be at least 18 years old
• Be ordinarily resident at an address in Ireland

If you have no address, you can register with ‘no fixed address.’ You can give an address where you can get correspondence.

If you have more than one address, you should give the address where you want to be registered. You can only be registered at one address.

You can register to vote:

• Online at checktheregister.ie
• By filling in an application form

If you do not give a PPS number, you must get your form and ID witnessed at a local Garda station.

Deadline for registering to vote

Your application must be received by the local authority at least 15 days before an election or referendum (excluding Sundays, Good Friday and public holidays). If it is received on or after 14 days before an election or referendum is taking place, you will not be registered to vote in that election or referendum.

Pending elector list

You can add your details to the ‘pending elector list’ if you are 16 or 17 and you are ordinarily resident in Ireland.

Anonymous electors

The Register of Electors can be inspected at local authority offices. If you are concerned that having your details available for inspection would put you in danger, you can apply to be an anonymous elector. You can get the form to make this request at checktheregister.ie.

The Register of Electors is a public document. Your PPS number and your date of birth will not be published.

Updating your details

You can now update your details at any time during the year. The easiest way to do this is on checktheregister.ie.

You must change your details at least 15 days before polling day. Sundays, public holidays and Good Friday are not counted as days for this purpose.

If you are already registered, you should check your details and add your PPS number, date of birth and your Eircode on checktheregister.ie. This will allow the local authority to check your details are correct. Your PPS number and date of birth will not be published on the electoral register.

Third party requests

You can apply to update the register if you have reasonable grounds to believe an entry about another person is inaccurate. For example, you can apply to update the register if someone has died.

Local authority’s duty to maintain the register

The local authority can ask for documents to prove that you are eligible to vote as part of its duty to make sure that the register is up to date.