The Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam won the most seats in a landslide election, on its first-ever attempt, without a majority of its own.

It won 108 of the 234 seats on offer.

That fell short of the 118-seat mark needed for a majority.

The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam finished second, falling to 59 seats on 24.2% of the vote.

The TVK's vote share reached 34.9%, which still converted into 46.2% of the seats under India's first-past-the-post system.

On 2 February 2024, actor Vijay launched Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK), growing it out of Vijay Makkal Iyakkam, a welfare network he had founded in 2009.¹

The AIADMK, which had split from the BJP in 2021, reunited with it for this election and named Edappadi K Palaniswami its chief ministerial candidate.²

The Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK), led by Anbumani Ramadoss, then joined the AIADMK-led front, followed by TTV Dhinakaran's Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam, another AIADMK splinter returning to the fold.³⁴

The Election Commission set single-phase polling for 23 April 2026, with counting on 4 May, and Vijay announced TVK would contest all 234 seats alone, rejecting both fronts.⁵⁶

In the campaign's final stretch, a PMK breakaway faction allied with VK Sasikala's party, the Tamilaga Valvurimai Katchi withdrew from the DMK-led front, and Kamal Haasan's Makkal Needhi Maiam chose to back that front rather than contest. DMK then released its full candidate list.⁷⁸⁹¹⁰

The single biggest movement of the election ran from the DMK to the TVK.

It covered 65 of the 163 seats that changed hands across the state.

The DMK, which had governed until this election, saw its own seat count collapse.

Turnout, the share of registered voters who actually cast a ballot, rose +13.2 pp from the last election, the highest the state has recorded.

Tiruppattur, Tamil Nadu saw the tightest finish anywhere in the state: the margin — how far ahead the winner finished, in votes, over whoever came second — was 1 vote, the closest possible outcome short of a tie.

Edappadi, Tamil Nadu saw the widest margin of the election, with the winner finishing 38.0% of the vote ahead of the runner-up.

Karur, Tamil Nadu recorded the highest turnout of any seat, 94.4%, and also drew the most candidates anywhere, 79.

Shozhinganallur, Tamil Nadu was the largest constituency by registered voters, with 5,53,978 names on its rolls.

NOTA — None of the Above, a ballot option letting voters formally reject every candidate on offer — drew 1,99,801 votes statewide, 0.4% of the total.

On 17 October 1972, DMK expelled M G Ramachandran as party treasurer; he founded the Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam that same year.¹¹

He renamed it the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam on 12 September 1976, creating Tamil Nadu's second major Dravidian party.¹¹

DMK and the renamed AIADMK have contested every state assembly election since 1977, a rivalry this election's debut winner joined for the first time.¹¹