Bulgarian Election Commission Prepares Machine Voting for Oct 2026 Presidential Election

The Central Election Commission (CEC) of Bulgaria confirmed that the upcoming presidential election on 25 October 2026 will be conducted with mandatory electronic voting in roughly 9,400 polling stations that have more than 300 voters. About 12,000 voting machines are to be placed in service, and a working group is overseeing their preparation.

CEC spokesperson Stoyanka Balova said the devices performed without defect in the recent parliamentary vote on 19 April, but many require maintenance such as battery and flash‑memory replacement, and parts like caps, printers and displays need to be swapped. A public procurement process for the repairs is still pending. The election date was set by the National Assembly, with a possible second‑round runoff scheduled for 1 November if no candidate secures a majority.