Will Linke win the most seats in the 2026 Berlin state elections?

Analysis

Die Linke sits atop Berlin polling in the low 20s, a few points clear of a tightly bunched CDU, AfD and Greens, all stuck in the high teens, ahead of the September 20 vote. The governing SPD trails further behind. That edge is not a fluke. It rests on genuine anger at the CDU-SPD coalition's handling of a January power outage. The failure was serious enough that the CDU swapped out its own lead candidate mid-cycle. Linke's candidate, Elif Eralp, has consolidated left-leaning voters while the right-of-center vote stays split three ways. Germany's proportional system means vote share tends to carry through to seats fairly directly. That favors whoever is out front now. A three to five point cushion in a four-way scramble is a real advantage, even if the outcome is far from settled. The honest counterweight is national momentum. AfD leads polls across Germany and already runs second even in a city as liberal as Berlin. Protest energy can shift quickly in a final stretch. If that surge lands disproportionately in Berlin turnout, the gap narrows fast. That is the case for skepticism, and it carries real weight. Still, coalition fatigue and Linke's consolidated left flank give it the edge heading into the close. One thing to watch: whether AfD's national surge shows up in Berlin-specific polling in the final week before ballots are cast.