French presidential election to take place in April 2022

Next year's presidential elections in France will take place in April, with the first round on the 10th and the run-off on the 24th, government spokesman Gabriel Attal said on Tuesday.

French voters will choose their next president between 10 and 24 April 2022. © Reuters/Christian Hartmann

French presidents are elected to five-year terms in a two-round poll, with the two candidates who get the most votes in the first round facing off in the second.

During the last vote in 2017, centrist Emmanuel Macron beat the far-right leader Marine Le Pen.

Macron is widely expected to stand for a second term, though he has not yet declared his candidacy.

Le Pen was re-elected president of the National Rally (RN) on 4 July and has formally launched what will be her third attempt at the presidency.

The mainstream right-wing party Les Républicains (LR) will be represented by the former labour minister Xavier Bertrand. 

He is expected to challenge Macron for the votes of conservative moderates.

On the left, several candidates are jockeying for position, including the leader of the hard-left France Unbowed party, Jean-Luc Melenchon, who has announced he will make his third bid for the presidency, and several presidential hopefuls from the Greens party.

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The first round of the presidential election will take place during the  spring school holidays, which have been scheduled - depending on the region - between 9 April and 9 May.