AtlasIntel Poll Has Flávio 49.8%, Lula 47.6%
BRAZIL · ELECTION POLLS
Key Facts
- —The country Brazil, Latin America’s largest economy, holds its presidential runoff on Sunday 25 October 2026 between President Lula and Senator Flávio Bolsonaro.
- —Why it matters The outcome shapes the outlook for Brazilian stocks, bonds and the real held by US investors, so every new poll in the last week moves expectations.
- —Why now The AtlasIntel survey appeared in Brazilian media on Monday 19 October 2026 by 7:30 a.m. Brasília time (6:30 a.m. ET), after interviews ended on Sunday 18 October.
- —What happened Flávio has 49.8% and Lula 47.6%, with 2.6% blank, null or undecided, which is 51.1% to 48.9% on valid votes.
- —The numbers Flávio’s lead fell from 5.4 points in AtlasIntel’s 9 October poll to 2.2 points, as Lula gained 1.9 points and Flávio lost 1.3 points.
- —What it means for you US investors face a runoff that the three big surveys of the past week give to Flávio by a narrow margin and that betting markets give to him by a wider one.
- —Still open Whether the narrowing continues, since interviews closed before the Band debate on the evening of 18 October.
- —Prediction markets Polymarket gives Flávio Bolsonaro a 77.1% chance of winning the 25 October runoff and Lula 22.5% (19 October, 6:57 a.m. ET). Polymarket puts Flávio Bolsonaro’s chance of winning at 77% and Kalshi at 79% (Lula: 23% and 21%), as of 19 October, 7:20 am ET; prices are bets, not polls.
- —Power Index Brazil ranks 1st of 14 in The Rio Times Latin America Power Index, with 75.0 points (October 2026 edition).
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A new AtlasIntel poll, reported on Monday 19 October 2026, puts Flávio Bolsonaro on 49.8% and President Lula on 47.6% in the Brazil election 2026 runoff. The 2.2-point lead for Flávio is less than half of the 5.4 points the same pollster found ten days earlier.
For US readers, the vote on Sunday 25 October decides who runs Latin America’s largest economy, and AtlasIntel publishes its Brazil polls jointly with Bloomberg, the US financial news group. Our Brazil election polls tracker lists the other recent surveys, the Brazil election odds page shows live betting prices and the Brazil runoff date page sets out the schedule.
What the AtlasIntel Poll Shows
Counting all answers, Flávio has 49.8% and Lula 47.6%, while 2.6% said they would vote blank, spoil the ballot or did not know. Valid votes, which leave out blank and spoiled ballots the way Brazil’s electoral court counts the result, give Flávio 51.1% and Lula 48.9%.
Flávio, a senator for Rio de Janeiro, runs for the conservative Liberal Party (PL), the party of his father, former president Jair Bolsonaro. Lula, of the left-wing Workers’ Party (PT), is seeking a fourth term as president.
With a margin of error of one point on each share, a lead of 2.2 points is real but not locked in. The financial news site InfoMoney noted that the central figures still put Flávio numerically ahead.
Change Since the 9 October Poll
AtlasIntel’s previous round, with interviews from 3 to 8 October and results published on Friday 9 October, had Flávio at 51.1% and Lula at 45.7%, under registration BR-03663/2026. Flávio has therefore lost 1.3 points and Lula has gained 1.9 points, which narrows the gap from 5.4 points to 2.2 points, as in our report on that poll.
On valid votes the move is from 52.8% to 51.1% for Flávio and from 47.2% to 48.9% for Lula, a shift of 1.7 points each. The share of blank, null and undecided answers fell from 3.2% to 2.6%.
The pollster’s last survey before the first round, published on Saturday 3 October, had Lula at 47.0% and Flávio at 44.1% of valid votes. The count on Sunday 4 October gave Flávio 47.03% and Lula 45.16%, so any single poll is a snapshot with a known error.
How the Poll Was Done
AtlasIntel interviewed 4,998 people across all 26 states and the Federal District from Tuesday 13 to Sunday 18 October, using an online method it calls Atlas RDR, short for random digital recruitment. The margin of error is one percentage point at a 95% confidence level.
The survey is registered with the Superior Electoral Court (TSE), Brazil’s election authority, under number BR-02418/2026. Brazilian law requires every published election poll to be registered there.
Brazilian outlets including Money Times, Metrópoles and Jovem Pan published the results on Monday 19 October at 7:30 and 7:31 a.m. Brasília time (6:30 a.m. ET). The last day of interviews was Sunday 18 October, so the poll was released the next morning.
Who Backs Whom
SBT News and Jovem Pan both report that Lula leads among women and Flávio leads among men. SBT News adds that Lula is ahead among younger voters and Flávio among those aged 45 and over.
The reports we could compare did not agree on how to present the regional, education and religion breakdowns, and we could not open AtlasIntel’s own report. We therefore leave out those figures rather than print numbers that rest on one outlet.
Lula Approval and the Government Measures Tested
AtlasIntel finds that 46.2% of voters approve of Lula’s performance as president and 52.3% disapprove, with 1.5% unsure. InfoMoney reports that disapproval fell by one point and approval rose by one point from the previous AtlasIntel round.
Asked to rate the federal government, 50.6% said bad or terrible, 40.7% said great or good and 8.6% said regular. Jovem Pan and Metrópoles agree on all three figures.
Metrópoles lists the share rating each government measure great or good, led by removing federal taxes on fuel at 60% and ending the six-days-on, one-day-off work schedule known as 6×1 at 54%. Next come a Pix payment for micro-entrepreneurs to improve equipment and workspaces at 52%, debt forgiveness and renegotiation for them at 51% and the Pé-de-Meia Universitário student stipend at 48%.
InfoMoney notes that the Senate approved the end of the 6×1 schedule on 14 October, during the field period, and that 39% rated that measure bad or terrible. Metrópoles adds that 26% rated the fuel tax cut terrible, the highest positive score of the five measures but not a unanimous one.
How It Compares With Datafolha and Quaest
Datafolha, the polling arm of the Folha de S.Paulo newspaper group, interviewed 2,520 people from 13 to 15 October and published on Thursday 15 October. It gave Flávio 47% and Lula 45% of all answers, or 51% to 49% on valid votes, with a margin of two points and registration BR-00466/2026.
Quaest interviewed 2,154 voters from 10 to 13 October and published on Wednesday 14 October, with Flávio on 46%, Lula on 44% and 9% blank or null, under registration BR-08729/2026. InfoMoney’s report gives no valid-vote figures, which our own calculation puts at about 51% to 49%.
The AtlasIntel poll’s 51.1% to 48.9% on valid votes is therefore close to both, even though its totals for each candidate are higher because only 2.6% were unsure or blank, against 8% at Datafolha and 10% at Quaest. Its interviews also ran later than both, ending on 18 October.
Other polls from the same days point both ways. Vox Brasil, interviewing 15 to 17 October, had Lula ahead by 46.4% to 44.6% of all answers, as in our Vox Brasil report, while the BTG Pactual/Nexus poll, interviewed on 16 to 18 October, had Flávio on 50.3% and Lula on 49.7% of valid votes.
What It Means for You
For US investors in Brazilian stocks, bonds and ADRs, the poll says the race is closer than AtlasIntel’s 9 October round suggested, while Flávio still leads on the totals in the Datafolha, Quaest and AtlasIntel surveys of the past week. A narrower race can mean sharper moves in the real and in Brazilian shares in the final days, so the next polls matter more than any one reading.
What Is Not Known
We could not open AtlasIntel’s own report, so the figures rest on Metrópoles, Money Times, Jovem Pan, SBT News and InfoMoney, which agree on the headline numbers. InfoMoney prints 51.5% for Flávio on valid votes, which does not fit its own 48.9% for Lula, so we use the 51.1% that the other outlets and the arithmetic support.
Jovem Pan says Bloomberg commissioned the poll, while the other reports we read do not say who paid for it. We did not find the pollster’s own release or the news group’s.
Interviews ended before the Band debate between Lula and Flávio on the evening of Sunday 18 October, InfoMoney writes, so the poll cannot show any effect of the debate. The next debate is due on Friday 23 October, according to SBT News.
What Prediction Markets Say
On Polymarket, an online prediction market, bettors give Flávio Bolsonaro a 77.1% chance of winning the 25 October runoff and Lula 22.5% (19 October, 6:57 a.m. ET). The Brazil Presidential Election event has drawn about US$187.9 million in bets, with about US$22.9 million on the Flávio contract and US$26.6 million on the Lula contract.
Our report on the BTG/Nexus poll recorded Flávio at 78.5% at 1:49 a.m. ET on Monday, so his price has eased by about 1.5 points since then. We do not attribute that move to the poll alone, and these are bets, not polls.
Prediction markets · who wins the runoff
Implied chance of winning Brazil’s presidency on 25 October, from traders’ prices.
Polymarket
Flávio Bolsonaro 77% · Lula 22.5% (US$188 million traded)
Kalshi (regulated in the US by the CFTC)
Flávio Bolsonaro 79% · Lula 21%
As of 19 October, 7:20 am ET (12:20 Lisbon), updated every 20 minutes. Prices are bets, not polls, and can move fast.
Why we show this: prediction markets turn real-money bets into a live probability that moves within minutes of the news, which is why investors, campaigns and newsrooms in the United States now follow them closely. We show them next to polls and official results, never instead of them.
Why we show this: prediction markets turn real-money bets into a live probability that moves within minutes of the news, which is why investors, campaigns and newsrooms in the United States now follow them closely. We show them next to polls and official results, never instead of them.
Frequently Asked Questions
What does the new AtlasIntel poll show for the Brazil runoff?
It gives Flávio Bolsonaro 49.8% and Lula 47.6%, or 51.1% to 48.9% on valid votes. That is a lead of 2.2 points for Flávio, down from 5.4 points in AtlasIntel’s poll of 9 October.
When was the AtlasIntel poll published?
Brazilian outlets published it on Monday 19 October 2026 between 7:00 and 7:31 a.m. Brasília time. Interviews ran from Tuesday 13 to Sunday 18 October.
How many people did AtlasIntel interview?
AtlasIntel interviewed 4,998 people online, with a margin of error of one percentage point at a 95% confidence level. The poll is registered with the electoral court as BR-02418/2026.
How does the AtlasIntel poll compare with Datafolha and Quaest?
Datafolha had Flávio at 51% and Lula at 49% on valid votes on 15 October, and Quaest had them at 46% and 44% of all answers on 14 October. AtlasIntel’s valid-vote result of 51.1% to 48.9% is close to both.
When is the Brazil runoff?
Brazil votes on Sunday 25 October 2026 in the runoff between Lula and Flávio Bolsonaro. The electoral court, the TSE, announces the official result after the count.
Sources: Jovem Pan, 19 October 2026; Metrópoles, 19 October 2026; Money Times, 19 October 2026; InfoMoney, 19 October 2026; SBT News, 19 October 2026; Gazeta do Povo, 9 October 2026; InfoMoney on Datafolha, 15 October 2026; InfoMoney on Quaest, 14 October 2026.
This article was drafted with automated assistance and reviewed before publication. How we use AI · Report an error · Editorial responsibility: Matthias Camenzind, Editor-in-Chief