List of United States presidential elections by popular vote margin

In United States presidential elections, the national popular vote is the sum of all votes cast in every state and the District of Columbia.

The Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides the procedure by which the President and Vice President are elected, which is through the Electoral College.

Since the United States does not hold national elections, the national popular vote does not determine the outcome of the United States presidential election.

Graph of voter turnout percentage from 1824 to 2008.

List

The table below can be sorted to display elections by their presidential term / year of election, name, margin by percentage in popular vote, popular vote, margin in popular vote by number, and the runner up in the Electoral College.

#	Year	Electoral College	Party	Popular vote (%)		Popular vote		Electoral College	Party	Turnout
		Winner			Margin		Margin	Runner-up
Democratic-Republican   Democratic   Republican   Whig   Progressive   Liberal Republican   National Republican         Indicates winner lost popular vote
10	1824	John Quincy Adams	D.-R.	30.92%	−10.44%	113,142	−38,221	Andrew Jackson	D.-R.	26.90%
23	1876	Rutherford Hayes	Rep.	47.92%	−3.00%	4,034,142	−252,666	Samuel Tilden	Dem.	81.80%
26	1888	Benjamin Harrison	Rep.	47.80%	−0.83%	5,443,633	−94,530	Grover Cleveland	Dem.	79.30%
54	2000	George W. Bush	Rep.	47.87%	−0.51%	50,460,110	−543,816	Al Gore	Dem.	51.30%
24	1880	James Garfield	Rep.	48.31%	0.09%	4,453,337	1,898	Winfield Scott Hancock	Dem.	79.40%
44	1960	John Kennedy	Dem.	49.72%	0.17%	34,220,984	112,827	Richard Nixon	Rep.	62.77%
25	1884	Grover Cleveland	Dem.	48.85%	0.57%	4,914,482	57,579	James Blaine	Rep.	77.50%
46	1968	Richard Nixon	Rep.	43.42%	0.70%	31,783,783	511,944	Hubert Humphrey	Dem.	60.84%
15	1844	James Polk	Dem.	49.54%	1.45%	1,339,570	39,413	Henry Clay	Whig	78.90%
48	1976	Jimmy Carter	Dem.	50.08%	2.06%	40,831,881	1,683,247	Gerald Ford	Rep.	53.55%
55	2004	George W. Bush	Rep.	50.73%	2.46%	62,040,610	3,012,171	John Kerry	Dem.	55.27%
27	1892	Grover Cleveland	Dem.	46.02%	3.01%	5,553,898	363,099	Benjamin Harrison	Rep.	74.70%
33	1916	Woodrow Wilson	Dem.	49.24%	3.12%	9,126,868	578,140	Charles Evans Hughes	Rep.	61.60%
57	2012	Barack Obama	Dem.	51.06%	3.86%	65,915,796	4,982,296	Mitt Romney	Rep.	54.87%
28	1896	William McKinley	Rep.	51.02%	4.31%	7,112,138	601,331	William Jennings Bryan	Dem.	79.30%
41	1948	Harry Truman	Dem.	49.55%	4.48%	24,179,347	2,188,055	Thomas Dewey	Rep.	53.00%
16	1848	Zachary Taylor	Whig	47.28%	4.79%	1,360,235	137,882	Lewis Cass	Dem.	72.70%
21	1868	Ulysses Grant	Rep.	52.66%	5.32%	3,013,790	304,810	Horatio Seymour	Dem.	78.10%
52	1992	Bill Clinton	Dem.	43.01%	5.56%	44,909,806	5,805,256	George H. W. Bush	Rep.	55.23%
14	1840	William Henry Harrison	Whig	52.87%	6.05%	1,275,583	145,938	Martin Van Buren	Dem.	80.20%
29	1900	William McKinley	Rep.	51.64%	6.12%	7,228,864	857,932	William Jennings Bryan	Dem.	73.20%
17	1852	Franklin Pierce	Dem.	50.83%	6.95%	1,605,943	219,525	Winfield Scott	Whig	69.60%
56	2008	Barack Obama	Dem.	52.93%	7.27%	69,498,516	9,550,193	John McCain	Rep.	58.23%
40	1944	Franklin Roosevelt	Dem.	53.39%	7.50%	25,612,916	3,594,987	Thomas Dewey	Rep.	55.90%
51	1988	George H. W. Bush	Rep.	53.37%	7.72%	48,886,597	7,077,121	Michael Dukakis	Dem.	50.15%
53	1996	Bill Clinton	Dem.	49.23%	8.51%	47,400,125	8,201,370	Bob Dole	Rep.	49.08%
31	1908	William Taft	Rep.	51.57%	8.53%	7,678,335	1,269,356	William Jennings Bryan	Dem.	65.40%
49	1980	Ronald Reagan	Rep.	50.75%	9.74%	43,903,230	8,423,115	Jimmy Carter	Dem.	52.56%
39	1940	Franklin Roosevelt	Dem.	54.74%	9.96%	27,313,945	4,966,201	Wendell Willkie	Rep.	62.50%
20	1864	Abraham Lincoln	Rep.	55.03%	10.08%	2,211,317	405,090	George McClellan	Dem.	73.80%
19	1860	Abraham Lincoln	Rep.	39.65%	10.13%	1,855,993	474,049	John Breckinridge	Dem.	81.20%
42	1952	Dwight Eisenhower	Rep.	55.18%	10.85%	34,075,529	6,700,439	Adlai Stevenson	Dem.	63.30%
22	1872	Ulysses Grant	Rep.	55.58%	11.80%	3,597,439	763,729	Horace Greeley	L. R.	71.30%
18	1856	James Buchanan	Dem.	45.29%	12.20%	1,835,140	494,472	John Frémont	Rep.	78.90%
11	1828	Andrew Jackson	Dem.	55.93%	12.25%	642,806	140,839	John Quincy Adams	N. R.	57.60%
13	1836	Martin Van Buren	Dem.	50.79%	14.20%	763,291	213,384	William Henry Harrison	Whig	57.80%
32	1912	Woodrow Wilson	Dem.	41.84%	14.44%	6,296,284	2,173,563	Theodore Roosevelt	Prog.	58.80%
43	1956	Dwight Eisenhower	Rep.	57.37%	15.40%	35,579,180	9,551,152	Adlai Stevenson	Dem.	60.60%
36	1928	Herbert Hoover	Rep.	58.21%	17.41%	21,427,123	6,411,659	Al Smith	Dem.	56.90%
37	1932	Franklin Roosevelt	Dem.	57.41%	17.76%	22,821,277	7,060,023	Herbert Hoover	Rep.	56.90%
12	1832	Andrew Jackson	Dem.	54.74%	17.81%	702,735	228,628	Henry Clay	N.R.	55.40%
50	1984	Ronald Reagan	Rep.	58.77%	18.21%	54,455,472	16,878,120	Walter Mondale	Dem.	53.11%
30	1904	Theodore Roosevelt	Rep.	56.42%	18.83%	7,630,557	2,546,677	Alton Brooks Parker	Dem.	65.20%
45	1964	Lyndon Johnson	Dem.	61.05%	22.58%	43,127,041	15,951,287	Barry Goldwater	Rep.	61.92%
47	1972	Richard Nixon	Rep.	60.67%	23.15%	47,168,710	17,995,488	George McGovern	Dem.	55.21%
38	1936	Franklin Roosevelt	Dem.	60.80%	24.26%	27,752,648	11,070,786	Alf Landon	Rep.	61.00%
35	1924	Calvin Coolidge	Rep.	54.04%	25.22%	15,723,789	7,337,547	John Davis	Dem.	48.90%
34	1920	Warren Harding	Rep.	60.32%	26.17%	16,144,093	7,004,432	James Cox	Dem.	49.20%

Note: The popular vote was not recorded prior to the 1824 election, so the first nine US presidential elections are not included in this table.

Timeline

See also

• List of United States presidential elections by Electoral College margin

Sources

• Leip, David. Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections.
• Peters, Gerhard. Voter Turnout in Presidential Elections.

References

External links

• How close were U.S. Presidential Elections? - Michael Sheppard, Massachusetts Institute of Technology