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The 2026 French municipal elections are being held on 15 and 22 March 2026 to select the municipal councils of the approximately 35,000 communes in France. [1]
During the last municipal election in 2020, which was marked by the COVID-19 pandemic and the highest abstention rate for local elections in French history, the left reversed the trend of 2014. They narrowed the vote gap with the right by flipping cities such as Annecy, Bordeaux, Marseille, and Saint-Paul. Nevertheless, the right managed to reclaim several cities from the left, including Metz. The National Rally strengthened its local presence, winning the city of Perpignan while holding all the municipalities it controlled.
The 2022 French presidential election and legislative election saw the power of President of France Emmanuel Macron and his presidential majority weakened by the rise of both the far-right and the left. Concurrently, The Republicans were further diminished, resulting in their smallest parliamentary group since the start of the Fifth Republic.
In the European Parliament election of June 9, 2024, the National Rally saw its support soar, while the presidential majority list lost nearly half it seats. The left entered the election divided, despite having previously united in 2022 under NUPES. The joint list of the Socialist Party and Place Publique, as well as La France Insoumise, gained seats, while the French Communist Party again failed to secure representation, and The Ecologists plummeted from 13 seats to just five.
On the evening of the results of the European election, Emmanuel Macron dissolved the National Assembly. New legislative elections were held on June 30 and July 7, 2024, further upending an already disrupted political landscape. The left reunited and formed the New Popular Front in just a few hours. The Republicans faced an unprecedented crisis when their president, Éric Ciotti, formed an alliance with the National Rally. Though the centrists, headed by Renaissance, struggled with the President's decision to dissolve parliament, they maintained their Ensemble pour la République coalition.
Between the second round of voting, faced with the surge of the far-right, the left called for a "Republican Front," which most qualifying candidates joined. The final results saw the left-wing alliance NFP win a narrow plurality of 193 deputies. The National Rally became the largest single-party group in the National Assembly with 125 deputies, while Éric Ciotti formed his own group with 18 candidates. The center suffered a major collapse, losing one-thirds of its representatives.
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