RNZ poll: National hits new low under Luxon, Opportunity nears Parliament

Tuesday, 14 July 2026

National has slumped to its lowest level of support since Christopher Luxon became leader, while the fledgling Opportunity Party has surged to within a whisker of Parliament in the latest RNZ-Reid Research poll.

New Zealand First has also continued its upward climb, registering its strongest result in the Reid Research series in nine years.

If replicated on polling day, the results would likely return the current coalition government to power with the narrowest possible majority of 61 seats.

That calculation could change if either National or Te Pāti Māori won more electorates than their party vote entitled them to, causing an over-hang.

Likewise, Parliament's make-up would shift markedly if Opportunity tipped over the five percent threshold.

The poll - published on Tuesday - showed Labour maintaining its hold on the top spot at 34% , despite a drop in support of 1.6 percentage points since March.

National fell 2.1 points to 28.7% , its fourth consecutive decline in the Reid Research series and its weakest result since Luxon became leader in November 2021.

In contrast, New Zealand First rose for a third consecutive poll, climbing 0.9 points to 11.5% , its best showing with Reid Research since July 2017.

The Green Party edged up 0.2 points to 10.3% , while ACT gained 0.8 points to 7.8%.

But the biggest mover was the refreshed Opportunity Party, currently sitting outside Parliament.

Support for the party more than doubled, jumping 2.7 points to 4.7%, leaving it just 0.3 points short of the five percent threshold needed to enter Parliament without winning an electorate.

Te Pāti Māori was on 2.3%, down 0.9 points.

Undecided or non-voters made up 3.8% of respondents, a significant drop from 7.1% in March.

The poll was conducted between 2 and 9 July, following a string of policy announcements from all parties and the annual conferences of National, Labour and ACT.

If the poll results were replicated at the election, National would return 36 MPs, alongside 15 for New Zealand First and 10 for ACT, giving the coalition 61 seats in a 120-seat Parliament.

On the left, Labour would pick up 43 seats, the Greens 13 and Te Pāti Māori three. Together, that makes 59 MPs.

Those projections are based on party vote and assume no overhang seats. They also assume the return of all parties currently in Parliament.

National could extend the coalition's lead and the size of Parliament if it won more than 36 electorates, thereby creating an overhang. The party currently holds 43 electorates.

Similarly, Te Pāti Māori could close the gap if it picked up more than three electorates. The party won six of the seven Māori electorates at the last election.

If Opportunity crossed the five percent threshold, the composition of Parliament would change significantly, taking seats from the parties already represented.

In contrast to their parties' falling popularity, both National's Luxon and Labour's Chris Hipkins improved their personal standings.

Hipkins remained the most preferred prime minister, climbing 3.2 points to 23.9%. Luxon rose 2.7 points to 20%.

New Zealand First leader Winston Peters came in third on 13.2%, up 0.1 points.

Fifteen percent of voters either declined to nominate a prime ministerial candidate or said they did not know.

Voters also appeared less gloomy than they were in March, although sentiment remained firmly negative overall.

The results showed 34.7% (up 2.4 points) of respondents thought the country was heading in the right direction, compared to 46.5% (down 3.5 points) who thought the opposite.

That produced a net score of -11.8, an improvement of 5.9 points from the last poll in March.

About 17.5% of voters were undecided, while another 1.2% said they did not know.

National supporters were the most optimistic with a net score of +68.7, followed by ACT supporters on +37.7.

New Zealand First voters were considerably more pessimistic, recording a net score of -36.1.

This poll of 1000 people was conducted by Reid Research, using quota sampling and weighting to ensure representative cross section by age, gender and geography. The poll was conducted through online interviews between 2-9 July 2026 and has a maximum margin of error of +/- 3.1 percent at a 95 percent confidence level.