Independent New Hampshire Journalism · Northfield, NHAs of New Hampshire’s Sept. 8, 2026 primary, no incumbent was running for 112 of the 400 seats in the New Hampshire House, by Ballotpedia’s count. That is 28 percent of the chamber. Across the 46 states holding legislative elections in November 2026, the open share of lower-chamber seats was 16.7 percent. New Hampshire has no legislative term limits.
Audio edition (7:22): a synthetic voice reads the article. The charts, tables and fact check are on this page.
All 400 seats in the New Hampshire House are on the ballot every two years. In the eight elections from 2010 through 2024, an average of about 100 of those seats had no incumbent running, according to counts compiled by Ballotpedia, the nonpartisan online encyclopedia of American politics. For the general election of Nov. 3, 2026, the count is 112.
Ballotpedia defines an open seat as one where no incumbent filed to run, or where an incumbent filed but withdrew and did not appear on any ballot for the seat. An open seat, its analysis says, “is guaranteed to be won by a newcomer.” Its figures freeze at the time of the primary, which in New Hampshire was held Sept. 8, 2026.
The state Senate adds two more open seats out of 24. Together, the 114 open seats in New Hampshire are the most of any state on the 2026 ballot. Maine, the next highest, has 69.
Nine elections, one chamber
Ballotpedia’s House table runs from 2010 through 2026. The open-seat count ranged from 78 in 2020 to 118 in both 2012 and 2022. In that table, the 2026 figure of 112 is the third highest of the nine. Over the eight elections from 2010 through 2024, the table counts 798 open seats, an average of 99.75 an election.
Open Seats in New Hampshire House Elections, 2010–2026
Seats where no incumbent filed to run, out of 400. Bars are drawn to scale against the high of 118.
Granite State Report · Source: Ballotpedia, New Hampshire House of Representatives elections, 2026, open-seats table, 2010–2026; party split from Ballotpedia, Open seats in state legislative elections, 2026. Percentages are Granite State Report arithmetic from the counts.
Of the 112 open House seats in 2026, 59 were last held by Democrats when filing closed and 53 by Republicans, by Ballotpedia’s count. The two open Senate seats split one and one.
Against the other states
Ballotpedia counts 6,137 state legislative seats on the ballot in 46 states for Nov. 3, 2026, and 1,065 of them open, or 17.4 percent. New Hampshire’s 424 seats are 6.9 percent of the seats up nationally. Its 114 open seats are 10.7 percent of the open seats. As a share of its own seats, New Hampshire’s 26.9 percent ranks eighth.
The Highest Shares of Open Legislative Seats, 2026
Both chambers, seats on the Nov. 3, 2026 ballot. New Hampshire is shaded.
| State | Seats up | Open | Share open | Legislative term limits |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nebraska | 24 | 12 | 50.0% | Yes |
| Maine | 186 | 69 | 37.1% | Yes |
| Missouri | 180 | 62 | 34.4% | Yes |
| Wyoming | 78 | 24 | 30.8% | No (overturned in 2004) |
| Montana | 125 | 38 | 30.4% | Yes |
| Michigan | 148 | 44 | 29.7% | Yes |
| North Dakota | 70 | 19 | 27.1% | Yes |
| New Hampshire | 424 | 114 | 26.9% | No |
| All 46 states | 6,137 | 1,065 | 17.4% | 16 states have limits |
Granite State Report · Sources: Ballotpedia, Open seats in state legislative elections, 2026; Ballotpedia, State legislatures with term limits.
Six of the seven states ahead of New Hampshire limit how long legislators may serve; in those states, a member who reaches the limit must leave that chamber, in some states for good and in others for a set time. North Dakota adopted its limits in 2022. New Hampshire has no such limit. Wyoming’s voters adopted limits, and the Wyoming Supreme Court overturned them in 2004. In New Hampshire, a House seat opens when its holder decides not to run for it again, leaves it, or runs for a different seat.
Why the seats open
Ballotpedia counts 99 New Hampshire House incumbents who did not file for re-election in 2026, against an average of 100 for each election from 2010 through 2024. Two things let the number of open seats, 112, run higher than the number of members leaving. A seat with no sitting member has no incumbent to file, and Ballotpedia lists 18 vacant House seats as of October 2026. And under its methodology, an incumbent who files for a different seat in the same chamber still counts as an incumbent, and the seat that member held can be left open.
Open seats are not the only way the House changes hands. Eleven incumbents lost their party primaries on Sept. 8, 2026, Ballotpedia reports. From 2010 through 2024, the average was 13.3 a cycle. Those seats do not count as open, because an incumbent filed for each of them.
What it takes to file
Getting on a party’s primary ballot for the House costs little. Under RSA 655:19-c, a candidate who files a declaration of candidacy pays an administrative assessment of $2 for state representative, or instead files primary petitions signed by five members of the party. The fee for state senator is $10. Ballotpedia lists the 2026 filing deadline as June 12, 2026.
Representatives are elected from a mix of single-member and multi-member districts. In 2024, Ballotpedia reports, the 400 seats were spread across 203 districts. In a multi-member district, a voter may vote for as many candidates as there are seats, may vote for each candidate only once, and may leave some votes unused.
A narrated summary of this article (1:13), read by a synthetic voice. Photographs of the House chamber: Royalbroil (2014) and A.FLOCK (2023), via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0. Photograph of the State House: Warren LeMay, via Wikimedia Commons, CC0 1.0. Charts: Granite State Report from Ballotpedia figures. The video uses still images only. Because it adapts CC BY-SA 4.0 photographs, this video is offered under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Reading the numbers
These are Ballotpedia’s counts, not an official tally from the Secretary of State. Ballotpedia’s own pages do not always agree. Its New Hampshire House page counts 92 open House seats in 2024; its national open-seat page for 2024 counts 91. Its statewide totals for both chambers in 2014 and 2016, 113 and 118, would mean 20 and 15 open seats in the 24-seat Senate if its House table were right. Its 2016 House page reports 115 open House seats, not the 103 in the table; using that figure, the 2026 count would rank fourth of the nine. This article uses the House page’s table for 2010 through 2026 and the national page for the 2026 comparison among states, where the two pages agree on 112 open House seats.
An open seat measures turnover before the primary, not the result. It does not say whether a race is contested, which party will win it, or how experienced the winner will be. A former member who was out of office when filing closed would win an open seat as a non-incumbent. For more on the size of the House, see Granite State Report’s comparison of residents per seat in the New Hampshire House, and for an earlier look at new members, Freshman Files.
— Granite State Report
Your Turn
Tell us: are you running for an open House seat in your district, or did you serve and decide not to run again? What went into the decision? Write to granitestatereport@gmail.com. No person or agency named in this article was asked to comment for it. Any of them may write to the same address; a response will be added here with its date.
Fact check
| # | Claim | Status | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Open House seats by year: 93 (2010), 118 (2012), 93 (2014), 103 (2016), 103 (2018), 78 (2020), 118 (2022), 92 (2024), 112 (2026), of 400. | ATTRIBUTED | Ballotpedia, New Hampshire House of Representatives elections, 2026, open-seats table. |
| 2 | 798 open seats from 2010 through 2024, an average of 99.75; 2026 is third highest of nine in the House table; percentages in the chart. | VERIFIED | Granite State Report arithmetic from row 1. |
| 3 | Ballotpedia’s open-seat definition, its “guaranteed to be won by a newcomer” phrase, and that its figures freeze at the primary. | ATTRIBUTED | Ballotpedia, Open seats in state legislative elections, 2026, terms and methodologies. |
| 4 | The 2026 primary was Sept. 8, 2026; the general election is Nov. 3, 2026; the filing deadline was June 12, 2026. | ATTRIBUTED | Ballotpedia, New Hampshire House of Representatives elections, 2026. |
| 5 | 2026: 112 open House seats (59 last held by Democrats, 53 by Republicans) and 2 of 24 Senate seats (one each); 114 of 424 in all, 26.9 percent. | ATTRIBUTED | Ballotpedia, Open seats in state legislative elections, 2026, New Hampshire section. |
| 6 | 6,137 seats up in 46 states and 1,065 open, 17.4 percent; lower chambers 828 of 4,958, 16.7 percent (Granite State Report arithmetic); New Hampshire’s 114 is the most of any state, Maine next at 69; the shares of the eight states in the table. | ATTRIBUTED | Ballotpedia, Open seats in state legislative elections, 2026, summary and state table. |
| 7 | New Hampshire’s seats are 6.9 percent of seats up and its open seats 10.7 percent of open seats; it ranks eighth by share. | VERIFIED | Granite State Report arithmetic: 424 ÷ 6,137; 114 ÷ 1,065; ranking from the Ballotpedia state table. |
| 8 | Sixteen states limit legislators’ terms, including Nebraska, Maine, Missouri, Montana, Michigan and North Dakota (adopted 2022); limits are lifetime in Michigan, Missouri and North Dakota and consecutive in Maine, Montana and Nebraska; New Hampshire does not; the Wyoming Supreme Court overturned Wyoming’s limits in 2004. | ATTRIBUTED | Ballotpedia, State legislatures with term limits. |
| 9 | 99 House incumbents did not file for re-election in 2026; the 2010–2024 average was 100. | ATTRIBUTED | Ballotpedia, New Hampshire House of Representatives elections, 2026, retiring incumbents. |
| 10 | An incumbent who files for another seat in the same chamber still counts as an incumbent, and the seat left behind can be open. | ATTRIBUTED | Ballotpedia, Open seats in state legislative elections, 2026, terms and methodologies. |
| 11 | Eleven incumbents lost primaries in 2026; the 2010–2024 average was 13.3 a cycle. | ATTRIBUTED | Ballotpedia, New Hampshire House of Representatives elections, 2026, incumbents defeated in primaries. |
| 12 | The administrative assessment is $2 for state representative and $10 for state senator; a candidate may instead file primary petitions, five for state representative. | VERIFIED | RSA 655:19-c, paragraphs I and III, gc.nh.gov; Ballotpedia, New Hampshire House of Representatives elections, 2026, ballot access. |
| 13 | In 2024 the 400 seats were in 203 districts; multi-member district voters may cast as many votes as there are seats, one per candidate, and may leave votes unused. | ATTRIBUTED | Ballotpedia, New Hampshire House of Representatives elections, 2026, election history and district description. |
| 14 | Ballotpedia’s House page counts 92 open seats in 2024 and its national 2024 page counts 91; its statewide two-chamber totals for 2014 and 2016 (113 and 118) exceed the House counts (93 and 103) by 20 and 15; Ballotpedia’s 2016 House page reports 115 open seats. | VERIFIED | Ballotpedia, New Hampshire House of Representatives elections, 2016 and 2026; Open seats in state legislative elections, 2024 and 2026. |
| 15 | Ballotpedia lists 18 vacant House seats as of October 2026. | ATTRIBUTED | Ballotpedia, New Hampshire House of Representatives elections, 2026, partisan composition table. |
| 16 | The chamber photograph is by Royalbroil, taken Aug. 20, 2014, CC BY-SA 4.0; the State House photograph is by Warren LeMay, Sept. 27, 2019, CC0 1.0; the 2023 chamber photograph in the video is by A.FLOCK, CC BY-SA 4.0. | VERIFIED | Wikimedia Commons file pages, read Oct. 18, 2026. |
Candidate filings, withdrawal notices and the dates on them are what build the record. Confidentiality respected where possible. granitestatereport@gmail.com · (603) 931-9264.
Editor’s note. Open-seat counts, retirement and primary-defeat figures, election dates, district counts and the national comparison are drawn from Ballotpedia’s New Hampshire House of Representatives elections pages for 2016 and 2026 and its Open seats in state legislative elections pages for 2024 and 2026. Term-limit status is drawn from Ballotpedia’s State legislatures with term limits page. Filing fees and petition requirements are drawn from RSA 655:19-c. Percentages, averages, shares and rankings are Granite State Report arithmetic from those figures.
Corrections: Granite State Report corrects verified errors promptly and appends a dated note identifying what changed and when. The corrections policy and the corrections register are public, and correction notes are never removed.
