The data and calculations behind FiveThirtyEight's pollster ratings.
- Interactive table of pollster ratings
- How FiveThirtyEight calculates pollster ratings
- The State Of The Polls, 2016
Past data:
###pollster-stats-full.xlsx
A spreadsheet with all of the summary data and calculations involved in determining the pollster ratings.
###pollster-ratings.csv
| Header | Definition |
|---|---|
Pollster |
The organization that conducted the poll (rather than the organization that paid for or sponsored it). |
Live Caller With Cellphones Cellphones |
Yes indicates the polling firm usually or always uses live telephone interviews and places calls to cellphones in addition to landlines (as of May 27, 2016). Text messages do not count. We assume a polling firm has not begun to include cellphones in its samples until we have evidence to the contrary. Pollsters that have routinely begun to include cellphones in their samples but are listed without a Yes should contact FiveThirtyEight. |
Internet |
Whether the polling firm usually conducts all of its interviews online, as of May 27, 2016. |
NCPP/AAPOR/Roeper |
Yes indicates that the polling firm was a member of the National Council of Public Polls (NCPP), a signatory to the American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR) Transparency Initiative, or a contributor to the Roper Center data archive as of May 27, 2016. |
Polls analyzed |
The number of polls conducted in the final three weeks of House, Senate, gubernatorial and presidential general election campaigns since 1998, and the last three weeks of presidential primaries and caucuses from 2000 through May 17, 2016. |
Simple Average Error |
A polling firm's average error, calculated as the difference between the polled result and the actual result for the margin separating the top two finishers in the race. |
Simple Plus-Minus |
A polling firm’s average error as compared with other polls of the same types of elections, also controlling for a poll’s sample size and the number of days between the poll and the election. Negative scores are favorable and indicate above-average performance. |
Races Called Correctly |
The percentage of polls in which the polling firm correctly identified the winner of the race. If the poll indicated a tie for the lead and one of the tied candidates won, the pollster received credit for half a win. |
Advanced Plus-Minus |
How a pollster’s average error has compared with other polling firms surveying the same races, accounting for the type of election polled, the number of days until the election, the poll’s sample size, the competitiveness of the race and the number of other pollsters surveying the same race. Negative scores are favorable and indicate above-average quality. |
Predictive Plus-Minus |
A projection of how accurate the poll will be in future elections relative to other polls, based on a combination of a pollster’s historical performance, the number of polls it has in the database, and our proxies for methodological quality. Negative scores are favorable and indicate above-average quality. |
538 grade |
A letter grade from A+ to F that reflects a pollster’s Predictive Plus-Minus score. Firms banned by FiveThirtyEight are automatically given a grade of F. |
Banned by 538 |
Yes indicates that the polling firm is not used in FiveThirtyEight’s election forecasting models because we are concerned that it has faked some polling results or engaged in other gross ethical misconduct. |
Mean-Reverted Bias |
A pollster’s historical average statistical bias toward Democratic or Republican candidates, reverted to a mean of zero based on the number of polls in the database. |
###raw-polls.csv
Contains all of the polls analyzed to give each pollster a grade.
| Header | Definition |
|---|---|
pollno |
FiveThirtyEight poll ID number |
race |
Election polled |
year |
Year of election (not year of poll) |
location |
Location (state or Congressional district, or "US" for national polls) |
type_simple |
Type of election (5 categories) |
type_detail |
Detailed type of election (this distinguishes between Republican and Democratic primaries, for example, whereas type_simple does not) |
pollster |
Pollster name |
partisan |
Flag for internal/partisan poll. "D" indicates Democratic poll, "R" indicates Republican poll, "I" indicates poll put out by independent candidate's campaign. Note that different sources define these categories differently and our categorization will often reflect the original source's definition. In other words, these definitions may be inconsistent and should be used carefully. |
polldate |
Median field date of the poll |
samplesize |
Sample size of the poll. Where missing, this is estimated from the poll's margin of error, or similar polls conducted by the same polling firm. A sample size of 600 is used if no better estimate is available. |
cand1_name |
Name of Candidate #1. Candidates #1 and #2 are defined as the top two finishers in the election (regardless of whether or not they were the top two candidates in the poll). In races where a Democrat and a Republican were the top two finishers, Candidate #1 is the Democrat and simply listed as "Democrat". |
cand1_pct |
Candidate #1's share of the vote in the poll. |
cand2_name |
Name of Candidate #2. Candidates #1 and #2 are defined as the top two finishers in the election (regardless of whether or not they were the top two candidates in the poll). In races where a Democrat and a Republican were the top two finishers, Candidate #2 is the Republican and simply listed as "Republican" |
cand2_pct |
Candidate #2's share of the vote in the poll. |
cand3_pct |
Share of the vote for the top candidate listed in the poll, other than Candidate #1 and Candidate #2. |
margin_poll |
Projected margin of victory (defeat) for Candidate #1. This is calculated as cand1_pct - cand2_pct. In races between a Democrat and a Republican, positive values indicate a Democratic lead; negative values a Repubican lead. |
electiondate |
Date of election |
cand1_actual |
Actual share of vote for Candidate #1 |
cand2_actual |
Actual share of vote for Candidate #2 |
margin_actual |
Actual margin in the election. This is calculated as cand1_actual - cand2_actual. In races between a Democrat and a Republican, positive values indicate a Democratic win; negative values a Republican win. |
error |
Absolute value of the difference between the actual and polled result. This is calculated as abs(margin_poll - margin_actual) |
bias |
Statistical bias of the poll. This is calculated only for races in which the top two finishers were a Democrat and a Republican. It is calculated as margin_poll - argin_actual. Positive values indicate a Democratic bias (the Democrat did better in the poll than the election). Negative values indicate a Republican bias. |
rightcall |
Flag to indicate whether the pollster called the outcome correctly, i.e. whether the candidate they had listed in 1st place won the election. A 1 indicates a correct call and a 0 an incorrect call; 0.5 indicates that the pollster had two or more candidates tied for the lead and one of the tied candidates won. |
comment |
Additional information, such as alternate names for the poll. |