More than 6.5 million voters are registered for presidential, legislative and municipal elections, including nearly 1 million abroad.
El Salvador will hold its next general elections on Feb. 28, 2027, when voters will elect the president and vice president, members of the Legislative Assembly and municipal authorities, the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) announced Wednesday.
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The electoral authority approved the election call unanimously during a public session on Sept. 30, formally setting the calendar for a vote that will bring presidential, legislative and municipal elections together on the same day.
“The electoral day will be held on Sunday, Feb. 28, 2027,” TSE President Roxana Soriano said as she announced the resolution.
More than 6.5 million people are eligible to vote, according to the electoral registry as of Sept. 15, 2026. The total includes 5,551,707 voters in El Salvador and 982,682 registered abroad.
The election will determine 582 elected positions, including the president and vice president, 60 principal and 60 alternate seats in the Legislative Assembly, and municipal officials across the country: 44 mayors, 44 trustees, 196 principal council members and 176 alternates.
The president and vice president elected in 2027 will serve a six-year term from June 1, 2027, to June 1, 2033. Legislators and municipal authorities will take office on May 1, 2027, and serve three-year terms.
Salvadorans abroad
Salvadorans living abroad will have several voting options under the new electoral framework. Those with a national identity document and a registered foreign address will be able to vote online from Jan. 30 through Feb. 28, 2027.
The TSE will also provide in-person electronic voting for Salvadorans abroad who choose to vote with a passport or whose identity document lists a domestic address.
“For the first time, under our new constitutional framework, our brothers and sisters abroad will participate through their own electoral constituency, which will allow them to elect six legislators,” Soriano said.
The TSE plans to establish 92 voting centers across 29 countries and 66 cities. Fifty-three will be located in the United States. The figure is 11 more centers than were established abroad for the 2024 elections.
The constitutional changes underpinning the election were approved in July 2025 through a transitional provision that shortened the presidential term that began on June 1, 2024, bringing the presidential, legislative and municipal electoral cycles into alignment.
The reform also extended the presidential term from five to six years and eliminated the second-round runoff. The changes allowing presidential reelection were approved by Congress in 2025. The opposition’s small legislative bloc described the measure as a “death of democracy.”
Candidates and electoral calendar
The presidential field currently includes three candidates: incumbent President Nayib Bukele of Nuevas Ideas, former lawmaker Mayteé Iraheta of the right-wing Nationalist Republican Alliance (Arena), and trade union leader Rafael Aguirre of the left-wing Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN).
Bukele is seeking a third consecutive reelection after the 2025 changes removed the previous limit of two consecutive presidential terms.
Candidate registration for the presidency, vice presidency and Legislative Assembly will run from Oct. 1 to Nov. 19, 2026. Municipal candidate lists can be registered from Nov. 9 to Nov. 19.
Ahead of the vote, the TSE will conduct a November simulation of preliminary results transmission and remote voting, followed by a final-counting exercise in December.
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