Early voting for Georgia's midterm election began on Tuesday, Oct. 13, 2026, giving voters a nearly three-week window to cast ballots in races for governor, U.S. Senate, secretary of state and attorney general. The period runs through Friday, Oct. 30, with Saturday voting set for Oct. 17 and Oct. 24.
That start matters now because the ballot is stacked with contests that could help decide more than statehouse politics. Keisha Lance Bottoms is the Democratic candidate for governor, while Rick Jackson is the Republican nominee. In the Senate race, Mike Collins is challenging incumbent Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff, and the outcome could feed directly into the fight for control of Congress.
Andra Gillespie, a political scientist at Emory University, said that is why the race is drawing so much attention. “Control of Congress is what's most at stake, and that's really important,” she said. Republicans hold a 53-47 majority in the Senate, which means Democrats would need to keep every seat they already control and win four more to take over.
The opening day also gives an early test of whether turnout can exceed the pattern that usually defines midterm elections. More than 2 million people voted in the May primary, about 28% of Georgia's active voters, and Gillespie said this year could still produce “pretty robust turnout levels” because voters have strong opinions about what is happening in government. That is a sharper forecast than the usual midterm script, where participation tends to fall short of presidential-year levels.
Even so, the size of the vote will not be uniform across Georgia. Hours and locations for early voting vary by county, so a voter who wants to participate first has to check where and when the polls are open. Registered Georgia voters can verify their status and voting information on My Voter Page before heading out.
The question now is not whether voting has started. It has. The real measure of this election will be whether Georgia voters use the early window in numbers large enough to shape both the governor's race and the Senate battle before Election Day arrives.
