2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum

Polling day, 23 June 2016

Voters across the United Kingdom and Gibraltar answered the EU-membership question on 23 June 2016. Polling closed at 10 p.m. and counting ran through the night.

It took 107,100 polling-station staff across 41,050 stations to run the vote. 33,577,342 ballots were cast from a registered electorate of 46,500,001 — a turnout of 72.2% — and 25,359 of them were rejected.

Certified at 7:08 a.m., declared at 7:20

Leave received 17,410,742 votes to Remain's 16,141,241: 51.9% to 48.1% of valid votes.

Chief Counting Officer Jenny Watson certified the aggregate result at 7:08 a.m. and declared it at Manchester Town Hall at 7:20 a.m. on 24 June. The outcome turned on a single UK-wide majority; nothing required separate majorities in each constituent nation.

Nothing changed in law that morning

The referendum did not withdraw the UK from the EU or alter domestic law. Its force was political until Parliament acted.

David Cameron, who had called the referendum and campaigned for Remain, spoke outside Downing Street on the morning of 24 June. He accepted the result, said the country needed new leadership, and announced that he would stay on temporarily while a successor was chosen.

The map underneath the total was not uniform: Scotland, Northern Ireland, London and Gibraltar returned Remain majorities, while Wales and every English region except London returned Leave majorities.