Ranked choice voting produces better outcomes than plurality voting

What's this about?

People disagree about whether ranked choice voting works better than one-choice voting. The answer depends on the rules and what “better” means.

What supporters say

• Ranked choice may push people who run for office to seek wider support, not just one small group.
• Ranking choices can lower the spoiler effect, where a small vote splits help between two similar choices.
• A winner may gain support from more voters than a one-choice winner, especially when no one starts with more than half the vote.

What critics say

• The ballot can feel hard to use, and some voters may fill it out the wrong way.
• Different ranked choice rules can pick different winners from the same votes.
• If voters rank too few choices, their ballots may stop counting before the last round.
• The added steps can make vote counts and election work harder, with some trade-offs.

How to read this

The number of points on each side does not show who is right; the strength of the proof matters more.

The bottom line

Ranked choice can fix some problems with one-choice voting, especially the spoiler effect. But it does not always give a better result. The evidence does not show that ranked choice works better in every race, and its problems have strong support too.

Ranked choice voting can address some problems of plurality elections, but the evidence does not show that it is universally better. Its advantages and drawbacks depend on the counting method, the election setting and what voters mean by a “better” outcome.

The case for

Ranked choice voting can reduce the spoiler effect. In a plurality election, support for a minor candidate can change the result by drawing votes away from a similar major candidate. Under ranked choice voting, voters can list backup choices. If their preferred candidate is eliminated, their ballot may transfer to another candidate instead of becoming irrelevant. This can make the final result more closely reflect voters’ ordered preferences, especially when no candidate begins with majority support. 1

The system may also encourage candidates to seek broader support rather than appealing only to a narrow base. Because second-choice rankings can matter, candidates have a reason to avoid alienating voters who may support someone else first. Research on campaign messages and candidate behavior is consistent with the idea that ranked elections can encourage more moderate appeals and more civil communication. But it does not show that every ranked-choice election becomes less polarized, or that a more civil campaign necessarily produces better policies. 2

In theory, ranked choice voting can also produce a winner acceptable to more voters than a plurality winner who leads only because support is divided among several candidates. Successive rounds can eliminate candidates and compare the remaining contenders. However, that broader support is not guaranteed: if voters do not rank additional candidates, their ballots may not be available in later rounds. 3

The case against

The main concern is that some ballots stop counting before the final decision. Voters may rank only one or two candidates, or leave gaps in their rankings. If all of those choices are eliminated, the ballot becomes inactive even though it was counted at the start. This means the promise of a broadly supported or majority-backed winner is conditional on voters providing usable backup choices. 4

Ranked ballots are also harder to complete correctly than plurality ballots. Voters must understand the ordering system, transfers and what happens if they skip a ranking or make a marking error. Studies find that voters do not understand or use the system equally well, and research in New York City has raised specific concerns about ballot mistakes and voter difficulty. These problems could make formal voting power unequal in practice, particularly if some groups are more likely to submit incomplete or invalid ballots. 5

Another limitation is that “ranked choice voting” is not one single rule. Different preferential counting systems can choose different winners from the same rankings. Evidence that one method works well cannot automatically prove that every ranked system is better than plurality. Ranked elections may also require more voter education, more complicated ballot design, additional auditing and clearer explanations of elimination rounds. The administrative and legal costs are plausible concerns, but they have not been measured consistently enough to establish their size. 6

Research on turnout is similarly mixed. Some studies connect participation among younger voters with campaign civility and candidate contact in ranked-choice settings, but ranked and plurality elections often differ in timing, competitiveness, spending and political context. Those surrounding conditions make it difficult to determine how much of any difference is caused by the voting rule itself.

The bottom line

The evidence does not support the unqualified claim that ranked choice voting produces better outcomes than plurality voting. It provides fairly strong support for particular benefits, especially reducing spoiler effects and encouraging candidates to appeal more broadly. But those advantages are balanced by substantial concerns about ballot usability, incomplete rankings and equal participation in later rounds.

Plurality voting retains clear advantages in simplicity and continuous ballot counting, while ranked choice voting is most defensible where avoiding spoilers and rewarding broader appeal are the priorities. Overall, the evidence favors a conditional, not universal, judgment: both systems involve important tradeoffs, and the final comparison depends on the ranked method used, the jurisdiction and the outcome being measured.