Senator Flávio Bolsonaro led President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in four of Brazil’s five major regions in an AtlasIntel/Bloomberg poll released on October 9. The candidates face each other in the October 25 presidential runoff, after neither won the October 4 first round.

National polls put Bolsonaro above 50%

Polling institutes PoderData, Datafolha, AtlasIntel and Vox Brasil released their first runoff surveys on October 8 and 9. Their published figures use different measures: some count valid votes, while others include all responses.

Datafolha put Bolsonaro, the PL party’s candidate, at 52% of valid votes in its October 8 release. It interviewed 2,520 voters nationwide on October 6–7. The poll had a margin of error of two percentage points and a 95% confidence level.

AtlasIntel put Bolsonaro at 52.8% of valid votes in its October 9 release. Its online survey collected responses from 5,026 people between October 3 and 8. The reported margin of error was one percentage point, with a 95% confidence level.

Vox Brasil recorded 42.7% support for Bolsonaro among total responses, with 9.7% undecided or not answering. It conducted 2,100 face-to-face interviews on October 5–7, with a 2.15-point margin of error. Comparable national figures for both candidates are unavailable across all four surveys.

Lula leads in the Northeast

The AtlasIntel/Bloomberg regional breakdown showed Bolsonaro’s strongest support in the Central-West, at 65.7%, against Lula’s 33.6%. In the South, Bolsonaro had 64.5%, while Lula had 34.3%.

Bolsonaro also led in the Southeast, with 54.4% against 42.9% for Lula, the incumbent seeking reelection for the PT party. The North showed the closest contest: Bolsonaro had 51.1% and Lula 48.5%, a difference of 2.6 percentage points.

The Northeast was the only region where Lula led. He had 57.6% support there, compared with Bolsonaro’s 36.2%, giving the president a 21.4-point advantage.

Runoff follows a close first round

Bolsonaro finished the first round ahead of Lula nationally. Two Brazilian news outlets reported his share of valid votes as 47.03%, while CNN Brasil’s tally based on electoral authority data gave 47.04%; all reported Lula at 45.16%.

The second round will decide the presidency on October 25. The AtlasIntel survey’s collection period began on October 3, before the first-round vote, and ended on October 8.