Sanae Takaichi leads LDP to victory in 2026 Japanese election

Wednesday, February 11, 2026

Districts and proportional representation districts

The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has won the Japanese general election. The House of Representatives includes 465 seats, each with a member. For a party to fully control the House, it needs an outright majority of 233 seats. The LDP won 316 seats, giving the party a supermajority, the first time since World War II. The LDP leader, Sanae Takaichi, strengthened her mandate as the Prime Minister of Japan. The leaders of the Centrist Reform Alliance (Chūdō) (the main opposition party), Yoshihiko Noda and Tetsuo Saito, expressed their intent to resign after their defeat.

Chūdō lost more than two-thirds of its seats, dropping from 167 to 49. Experienced Chūdō candidates Jun Azumi, the secretary-general, Yukio Edano, and Ichirō Ozawa lost to LDP candidates Chisato Morishita, Yutaka Ihara, and Takashi Fujiawara, respectively. However, the 28 candidates of Komeito, which formed Chūdō with the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan prior to the election, all won seats, 4 more than before. There were concerns over Komeito’s prospects after its break with the LDP in October 2025.

The LDP attracted voters with Takaichi’s personal popularity and a strategy of promising populist spending, enthusiastic nationalism, and genuine engagement with younger voters on social media. A clip of Takaichi drumming with South Korean president Lee Jae Myung has gone viral, among others. Her manifesto emphasized tighter regulations on immigration, foreign ownership of Japanese land, and failures to pay tax and health insurance by foreign nationals. This has attracted criticism over its divisiveness. Businesses have expressed skepticism about the effectiveness of her proposed economic policy due to the national debt of Japan. Following the election, Takaichi was seen as being in a position to further escalate the 2025–2026 China–Japan diplomatic crisis and erode pacifism by amending the Constitution of Japan.

The new session of the House will begin on February 18, 2026.

2026 Japanese general election (constituency)
Party	Candidate	Votes	%	±%
LDP	Sanae Takaichi	27,789,183	49.23	+10.77
Chūdō	Yoshihiko Noda and Tetsuo Saito	12,209,686	21.63 (as CDP and Komeito)	-8.73
DPP	Yuichiro Tamaki	4,243,281	7.52	+3.19
Sanseitō	Sohei Kamiya	3,924,221	6.95	+4.45
Ishin	Hirofumi Yoshimura and Fumitake Fujita	3,742,160	6.63	-4.52
JCP	Tomoko Tamura	2,283,885	4.05	-2.76
GZN–Yukoku	Kazuhiro Haraguchi and Takashi Kawamura	354,617	0.63	New
Reiwa	Taro Yamamoto	255,496	0.45	-0.35
Team Mirai	Takahiro Anno	156,853	0.28	New
SDP	Mizuho Fukushima	148,666	0.26	-47.52
CPJ	Naoki Hyakuta	97,753	0.17	-37.27
Others	N/A	66,308	0.12	N/A
Independent	N/A	1,174,609	2.08	N/A
Total votes		56,446,718	100.00	+4.03
Registered voters/turnout		103,880,749	54.34	+0.50

2026 Japanese general election (proportional)
Party	Candidate	Votes	%	±%
LDP	Sanae Takaichi	21,026,139	36.72	+10.00
Chūdō	Yoshihiko Noda and Tetsuo Saito	10,438,801	18.23 (as CDP and Komeito)	-13.90
DPP	Yuichiro Tamaki	5,572,951	9.73	-1.59
Ishin	Hirofumi Yoshimura and Fumitake Fujita	4,943,331	8.63	-0.73
Sanseitō	Sohei Kamiya	4,260,620	7.44	+4.01
Team Mirai	Takahiro Anno	3,813,749	6.66	New
JCP	Tomoko Tamura	2,519,807	4.40	-1.76
Reiwa	Taro Yamamoto	1,672,499	2.92	-4.06
CPJ	Naoki Hyakuta	1,455,563	2.54	+27.05
GZN–Yukoku	Kazuhiro Haraguchi and Takashi Kawamura	814,874	1.42	New
SDP	Mizuho Fukushima	728,601	1.27	-22.04
Others	N/A	13,014	0.02	N/A
Total votes		57,259,949	100.00	+4.97
Registered voters/turnout		103,880,749	55.12	+1.28