How Marylanders register
Statewide new registrations by method, from the State Board's monthly reports, January 2010 to September 2026.
The reports count 249,171 new registrations from October 2025 to September 2026. The biggest groups: Motor Vehicle Administration (75%), ERIC matches (10%) and Paper forms and in person (5%).
Some registrations cluster in election years. Counting complete calendar years, even-numbered years hold about this share of each group's registrations: Online (87%), Same-day registration (99%), Provisional ballot (99%) and Military and overseas (96%).
Over time
Each chart shows the total of the 12 months ending at that month, so seasonal swings do not hide the trend. Hover for the figure for that month alone. Each chart has its own scale.
By calendar year
| Year | Motor Vehicle Administration | ERIC matches | Paper forms and in person | State agencies | Online | Provisional ballot | Same-day registration | Military and overseas | From another board | All |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 (9 months) | 146,379 | 8,983 | 851 | 9,978 | 7,821 | 18,053 | 1,582 | 416 | 0 | 194,063 |
| 2025 | 197,145 | 5,330 | 54 | 6,633 | 9,590 | 22,753 | 338 | 151 | 0 | 241,994 |
| 2024 | 190,102 | 43,677 | 31,453 | 22,431 | 17,386 | 18,666 | 30,112 | 3,684 | 0 | 357,511 |
| 2023 | 206,038 | 5,974 | 8 | 7,439 | 9,616 | 26,686 | 23 | 61 | 0 | 255,845 |
| 2022 | 199,423 | 17,075 | 6,256 | 21,635 | 10,710 | 27,314 | 11,900 | 1,292 | 0 | 295,605 |
| 2021 | 200,062 | 5,653 | 23 | 6,467 | 10,985 | 28,175 | 94 | 70 | 0 | 251,529 |
| 2020 | 145,996 | 93,163 | 16,450 | 43,720 | 42,822 | 58 | 7,571 | 6,603 | 0 | 356,383 |
| 2019 | 202,238 | 10,280 | 0 | 14,935 | 14,091 | 163 | 87 | 110 | 2 | 241,906 |
| 2018 | 190,544 | 39,073 | 5,016 | 25,839 | 22,180 | 986 | 12,342 | 970 | 286 | 297,236 |
| 2017 | 162,514 | 5,376 | 75 | 19,548 | 9,153 | 17,737 | 82 | 64 | 235 | 214,784 |
| 2016 | 217,950 | 90,496 | 9,107 | 52,349 | 16,308 | – | 20,157 | 2,614 | 567 | 409,548 |
| 2015 | 220,378 | 10,921 | – | 26,934 | 1,283 | – | 35 | 76 | 552 | 260,179 |
| 2014 | 141,284 | 14,002 | – | 39,332 | 2,358 | – | 9,348 | 799 | 718 | 207,841 |
| 2013 | 156,843 | 7,827 | – | 31,315 | 2,305 | – | 179 | 53 | 1,384 | 199,906 |
| 2012 | 176,696 | 60,901 | – | 114,747 | 7,297 | – | 19,985 | 3,350 | 1,156 | 384,132 |
| 2011 | 118,159 | – | – | 48,763 | 3,182 | – | 330 | 255 | 745 | 171,434 |
| 2010 | 105,865 | – | – | 58,911 | 3,217 | – | 11,299 | 1,221 | 691 | 181,204 |
A dash means the method had not yet appeared on the reports. Some methods are printed only in months when they have something to report; a month without a row counts as zero.
Who registers through each method
Party shares of the new registrations in the 12 months from October 2025 to September 2026. The last row is the share of all active voters today, for comparison.
| Method | Total | Democratic | Republican | Unaffiliated | Other |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Motor Vehicle Administration | 187,104 | 45% | 15% | 37% | 2% |
| ERIC matches | 25,996 | 53% | 18% | 27% | 2% |
| Paper forms and in person | 11,704 | 57% | 15% | 25% | 3% |
| State agencies | 10,893 | 52% | 12% | 31% | 6% |
| Online | 10,602 | 60% | 11% | 27% | 2% |
| Provisional ballot | 1,585 | 81% | 10% | 8% | 1% |
| Same-day registration | 851 | 82% | 11% | 6% | 1% |
| Military and overseas | 436 | 69% | 13% | 16% | 1% |
| All active voters | 51% | 23% | 23% | 2% |
How to read this
- The group names are Skipjack's. The State Board's own category names changed over the years (for example, two spellings of the elderly and disabled category), and several are folded together here so a group means the same thing in 2010 and today.
- Duplicate applications, which the reports print in their own column, are not counted.
- FPCA is the Federal Post Card Application used by military and overseas voters. ERIC is the Electronic Registration Information Center, a multi-state group whose data the board uses to find eligible residents who are not registered; the board's reports label the registrations that follow as "ERIC report".
- "From another board" is a small category the reports name only by that label. No report since April 2019 shows more than zero for it. Voters who move between counties are recorded as removals from the county they left.
- Online registrations first appear on the reports in July 2012 and same-day registrations in April 2016, so those charts begin there.
Which of the State Board's categories each group includes (as the reports spell them)
- Motor Vehicle Administration: MOTOR VEHICLE ADMINISTRATION
- ERIC matches: ERIC REPORT
- Paper forms and in person: BY MAIL; NVRA BY MAIL; IN PERSON; VOLUNTEER; RECRUITING; OTHER MEANS; OTHER
- State agencies: DESIGNATED STATE AGENCIES; SOCIAL SERVICES; ELDERLY / DISABLED; SOCSEC/ELDERLY / DISABLED; ELDERLY / DISABLED / SOC SEC
- Online: ONLINE REGISTRATION
- Provisional ballot: PROVISIONAL BALLOT
- Same-day registration: SAME DAY REGISTRATION; SAME DAY PROVISIONAL
- Military and overseas: ABSENTEE BALLOT (FPCA); MAIL-IN BALLOT (FPCA)
- From another board: FROM ANOTHER BOARD
Every number comes from the monthly reports, which are linked from each month's page. The underlying rows are in registration_summary_all.csv.