Exit polls are surveys conducted with voters immediately after they have cast their ballots. The purpose of exit polls is to provide an early indication of how an election has turned out, as in many elections the actual result may take hours to count. Exit polls are conducted by pollsters, usually private companies working for newspapers or broadcasters. The pollsters stand outside polling places at randomly selected precincts across the country and approach voters at specific intervals as they exit, for example every fifth or ninth voter. Voters who agree to participate fill out a short, confidential questionnaire and place it in a ballot box. Interviewers phone in the results three times during the day. When a voter refuses to participate, interviewers note the gender and approximate age and race of that voter. This information is used to statistically adjust the exit poll to ensure that all voters are fairly represented in the final results.

Exit polls are used to project an elections outcome before all votes are tallied. They provide valuable information to political analysts and media networks who use exit poll data to project election winners. Exit polls can also collect demographic data about voters, as well as information about what issues motivated voters to make their choices. Political parties and candidates can use this information to strategize for future elections.

Exit polls differ from traditional opinion polls, which take place before an election and measure voters intended choices as reported to pollsters. Exit polls are conducted after voters have cast their ballots and measure a voters response in real-time after the fact.

Exit polls have been used historically and throughout the world as a check against, and rough indicator of, the degree of election fraud. However, exit polls require a baseline to compare swing against, so they are not reliable for one-off votes such as the Scottish independence referendum or the UK EU membership referendum. Exit polls cant reach people who voted by postal ballot or another form of absentee voting, so they may be biased towards certain demographics and miss swings that only occur among absentee voters.

In summary, exit polls are surveys conducted with voters immediately after they have cast their ballots. They are used to provide an early indication of how an election has turned out, collect demographic data about voters, and help political parties and candidates strategize for future elections. Exit polls differ from traditional opinion polls, which take place before an election and measure voters intended choices as reported to pollsters.