New York City's mayoral election for the June 2025 primary once again employs ranked choice voting.

Early voting begins Saturday, June 14 and will be held for nine days ahead of Election Day on June 24. 

Mayor Eric Adams is running for reelection as an independent, while a whopping 11 candidates are competing in a crowded Democratic primary. CLICK HERE for interviews with the leading contenders and where they stand on the issues. 

What is NYC ranked choice voting?

Ranked choice voting, also known as instant runoff voting, allows voters to rank the candidates from their first to fifth choice. Advocates say it gives more diverse candidates a chance in normally combative elections. 

Back in 2019, more than 73% of New Yorkers voted in favor of ranked choice voting. The city then launched a $15 million campaign to educate voters about the new system. 

Ranked choice voting was first rolled out in February 2021 for a special election in Queens before taking effect for the citywide elections later that year. 

Then-Mayor Bill de Blasio famously asked New Yorkers to practice by ranking their favorite pizza toppings, and later announced pepperoni took home top honors with about 45% of the votes.

How does NYC ranked choice voting work?

Voters will rank their top five choices in order of preference. 

You do not have to rank all five, you can rank as many or as few as you like. If you only want to vote for one, then leave the other columns blank. 

All first-choice votes are counted first. If a candidate receives more than 50% of the first-choice votes, they win. If no candidate receives more than 50%, counting will continue in rounds. 

At the end of each round, the last-place candidate will be eliminated. Voters who chose that candidate will now have their vote counted for their next choice. 

Second-choice votes are only counted if your first-choice is eliminated. If both your first and second choices are eliminated, your vote is counted for your third-choice, and so on. 

This process continues until there are two candidates left, and the candidate with the most votes wins. 

The idea is to prevent a costly run-off election by having voters make their order of choices clear in the first place. 

Ranked choice voting can also create some unusual alliances where candidates, parties and other prominent figures offer guidance to voters about how they should rank their choices.

When will we know the election results? 

The first unofficial election results will be posted when polls close on Election Day. These include first-choice votes from early voting, Election Day and valid mail ballots. 

Then, ranked choice elimination rounds will be conducted, and reports will be released each week until the results are certified. 

Officials say the results will not be certified until all ballots are counted, including early mail, absentee, military, affidavit and emergency. 

An exit poll after the 2021 primary elections showed 95% of voters found the ballot simple to fill out, and 75% said they wanted to use ranked choice voting again. The state Assembly later met to discuss what did and did not work, pointing to some confusion and the long wait for the results. 

In that mayoral primary, the final results were certified nearly a month after the election. Then-Democratic nominee Eric Adams said he supported the system but questioned the rollout.

• New York City