Bulgaria's campaign for president and vice-president starts today, 23 September, ahead of the 25 October vote. The Central Election Commission has registered 27 presidential-vice-presidential pairs and has already drawn their numbers for the ballot. Campaigning runs until midnight on 23 October.

This time, voting machines will be used at nearly every polling station, with a few exceptions. There will be no machines at polling stations with fewer than 300 registered voters, or for mobile ballot boxes, hospitals, care homes for the elderly, and ships flying the Bulgarian flag. Stations abroad will also go without machines if fewer than 300 people applied to vote there or if fewer than 300 voted there in the last election. The commission set the rules for machine voting on 15 September.

Addresses for all 11,778 polling stations are now posted on the commission's website.

So far 18,430 Bulgarians in 66 countries have registered to vote abroad, said Boryana Stoynova from the foreign ministry. The figures are as of 11:00 on 23 September this year. Applications to vote abroad will be accepted until 29 September. Turkey has the most so far, with over 7,000 applications, followed by the United Kingdom with almost 3,000. Germany has sent in around 1,500 applications, the United States more than 1,300, and Spain over 700, Stoynova said.

The election was called after president Rumen Radev said in a televised address on 19 January 2026 that he would file his resignation with the Constitutional Court the next day. On 23 January 2026 the Constitutional Court confirmed Radev's resignation and declared his term ended early.

In late July, parliament set 25 October as the date for the new presidential and vice-presidential election.