Daily Maps · October 15, 2026 · Archive
The purple counties: decided by fewer than 5 points in 2024
142 of the 3,020 counties with data match: 2024 Presidential Margin from -5 to 5. The states with the most: VA (10), MN (9), WI (8), NC (8). The largest by population: Orange County, CA (3,175,227); Riverside County, CA (2,429,487); San Bernardino County, CA (2,180,563); Tarrant County, TX (2,113,854). Sources: OpenElections 2024.
How to read this map
The map sets one range on the county data: Political lean, county (2024 presidential margin) from D+5 to R+5. A county is drawn solid navy when it falls inside every range, dotted when it misses one, and hatched when it reports no figure for one of the measures, so a hatched county is neither a match nor a miss. Recounted today from the county database, 142 of the 3,020 counties with a figure for every range fall inside all of them, and Virginia has the most with 10. The count in the title is the count on the day the map ran; the two can differ when a source is refreshed.
The figures are the same ones behind every county page on this site: Census population and household income, Zillow home values, HUD fair market rents, County Health Rankings measures of crime and health, NOAA temperatures and USDA amenity scores, each stored with its publication year and listed below for this map. "Play with this map" opens the live county map with these ranges already set, so you can move a handle and watch the count change; "Make your own" starts from a blank map.
Sources
- OpenElections 2024
Solid navy marks counties inside every range on this map, dotted counties miss one or all of them, and hatched counties have no figure for that measure. On a heatmap, darker means higher and faded counties fall outside the range.