2023 Bulgarian local elections

Local elections in Bulgaria were held on 29 October 2023. Mayors and municipal councillors across the country were elected.

Electoral system
The elections to Bulgaria's municipal councils are conducted via proportional representation with an open list preferential voting system.

The mayoral elections take place within the context of a majoritarian two-round system. The first round of the elections will be held on 29 October. If no candidate in a given constituency manages to gain 50% of the vote, a runoff election will be held for that constituency in the second round on 5 November.

Voting is officially mandatory, but in practice there is no punishment for failing to vote and the law itself isn't strictly enforced.

Voters further have the option to vote against all proposed candidates.

Mayorship of Sofia
The election for the position of Mayor of Sofia, Bulgaria's capital and largest city, is expected to be hotly contested and will result in a new mayor being elected, as incumbent mayor Yordanka Fandakova from GERB has announced she will not seek re-election.

Opinion polls for Mayor of Sofia

First round
According to Central Election Commission the number of people who voted on 29 October totaled 2,713,979 or 44.94% of eligible voters. The turnout was 49.76% in the 2019 local elections. The invalid ballots in the 29 October, 2023 elections totaled over half a million, including 412,711 ballots for municipal councilors, 94,195 for municipality mayor (down from 128,204 in 2019) and 34,235 for mayoralty mayor.

In general, GERB had the strongest showing throughout the country, although the party failed to make it to the second round in the capital.

Second round
Overall, GERB won 11 regional towns, PP–DB won four, and the Bulgarian Socialist party won three. Of the largest four cities, PP-DB won in the capital (Sofia) and Varna while GERB won in Plovdiv and Burgas.