Labour’s Chris Hipkins is in a tie with National’s Christopher Luxon as the preferred prime minister in the 1News Verian poll released tonight.
Both leaders are now on 20% after Hipkins moved up 2 points in the past week following the TVNZ Leaders Debate last Tuesday.
Party support has meanwhile held largely steady, and Opportunity remains in the kingmaker’s seat, with neither the left nor the right bloc able to govern without them.
Luxon has previously ruled out working with Opportunity and he did so again today.
Poll: Opportunity holds balance of power as major parties tie - Watch on TVNZ+
The 1News Verian Poll continues to have Opportunity in the kingmaker seat. (Source: 1News)
In the party vote, National slipped 1 point to 28%, while Labour remained steady at 28%.
That would give each party 34 seats if repeated at the election on November 7 – now less than four weeks away – with both needing support partners to form a government.
Opportunity continues to perform strongly, up 1 point to 8%, which would give them 10 MPs. ACT are also up 1 point, to 10%. NZ First are steady, also on 10%, while the Greens fall 1 point to 15%. Te Pāti Māori continue to fall and are now on just 0.4%.
Opportunity leader Qiulae Wong told 1News she was “really happy to see the polling continue to trend up”, but said the party was not taking anything for granted.
“I would say I am more optimistic than not that we will be there, but again, we are potentially making history here,” she said.
While the cost of living was a key battleground in last week’s debate, voters’ outlook on the economy has barely moved.
Optimism dipped 1 point to 39%, while pessimism also fell 1 point to 25%, its lowest level this year and well down on the 52% recorded in April.
More voters now expect the economy to stay as it is, up 4 points to 37%.
National and Labour’s leaders are trading pot shots in the lead-up to the November 7 election. (Source: 1News)
The share of voters who were undecided or didn't say what party they wanted to vote for rose 1 point to 12% in today's poll.
Asked if he was happy with his party's polling, Labour's Hipkins pointed to that undecided figure as key to his plans. "There's still a very high undecided vote, and we're focused on winning that vote," he said.
"We've got some real on-the-ground momentum everywhere we go ... People are raising the same issues with us. The cost of living is out of control. The current government's doing nothing about it. We can't afford three more years of this government."
Meanwhile, asked how he could get more voters on board, National's Christopher Luxon acknowledged the race was close.
“There’s no doubt about it. It’ll be a very, very tight election, and my message is very simple. You know, if you want National policies, if you want National ministers, and if you want a National government, party vote National,” he said.
Luxon took aim at his Labour rival, saying New Zealanders did not think “Chris Hipkins is the solution to the problems that Chris Hipkins created”. He also again ruled out a grand coalition between the two major parties and ruled out working with Opportunity.
Wong will negotiate with biggest party first
The right bloc of National, NZ First and Act would have 58 seats by today’s poll.
Depending on how the Māori seats are calculated, the left bloc of Labour, the Greens and Te Pāti Māori would have 57 or 53 seats.
Under both scenarios, each bloc would need Opportunity to form a coalition.
Wong says she is asked “virtually every day” which side Opportunity will back.
“We will speak to the party who gets the largest amount of votes on election night first. We will negotiate in good faith with them. If we feel like we’re not getting anywhere and that an agreement is not possible, then we will go to the second largest party,” she said.
With National and Labour level in today’s poll, Wong said the party would decide who to approach first based on seats rather than party vote. If the two major parties had the same number of seats, it would open parallel negotiations.
“If it’s looking too close to call, we might need to wait until the special votes come in to make a decision on that,” she said.
She said Luxon having ruled out Opportunity would not change that approach, and the party would still speak to both sides in good faith.
A total of 1007 eligible voters were polled between October 8 and 12, half by mobile phone, the rest online. The poll has a maximum margin of error of ±3.1 percentage points.
ACT and National both released their fiscal plans during polling, with ACT pledging to lift the superannuation age, while National ruled out further tax cuts until after 2029.
The Greens also announced a plan to pay the wages of young people who have been out of work for six months or more.
The smaller parties have the chance to make their case to voters this evening in TVNZ’s Multi-Party Debate, on TVNZ 1, TVNZ+ and 1News.co.nz.
ACT leader David Seymour, Green Party co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick, NZ First leader Winston Peters, Te Pāti Māori co-leader Rawiri Waititi and Opportunity leader Qiulae Wong will take part in the debate hosted by Breakfast presenter Tova O’Brien.
See the full results and methodology
Between October 8 and October 12 2026, 1007 eligible voters were polled by mobile phone (501) and online using online panels (506). The maximum sampling error is approximately ±3.1%-points at the 95% confidence level. Party support percentages have been rounded up or down to whole numbers, except those less than 4.5%, which are reported to one decimal place. The data has been weighted to align with Stats NZ population counts for age, gender, region, ethnic identification and education level. The sample for mobile phones is selected by random dialling using probability sampling, and the online sample is collected using an online panel. Undecided voters, non-voters and those who refused to answer are excluded from the data on party support. The results are a snapshot in time of party support, and not a prediction.
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