Cost of Voting Index

The Cost of Voting Index (COVI) measures how easy or difficult it is to vote in each U.S. state. A higher score indicates more barriers to voting, while a lower score indicates fewer barriers.

Overview

The map below shows the Cost of Voting Index scores across U.S. states. States colored in darker shades have higher costs (more barriers) to voting, while lighter shades indicate lower costs (fewer barriers).

About the Data

The Cost of Voting Index takes into account various factors that can affect a citizen’s ability to vote, including:

• Registration deadlines
• Voter ID requirements
• Early voting availability
• Absentee voting rules
• Polling hours
• And other state-specific voting policies

The index provides a comprehensive way to compare the relative ease or difficulty of voting across different states.

Sources

This data comes from academic research on voting accessibility. For more details on the methodology, see: https://costofvotingindex.com/