Gallup
| Gallup | |
 | |
| Basic facts | |
| Location: | Washington, D.C. |
| Type: | Polling firm |
| Top official: | Jon Clifton, CEO |
| Year founded: | 1935 |
| Website: | Official website |
Gallup is a data analytics and polling company founded in 1935 by George Gallup. The organization performs data research and analysis for corporations and polls public opinion on politics, health, and presidential job approval, among other subjects.[1]
Background
Gallup was founded as a polling company by George Gallup, a market researcher for an advertising firm in New York City. According to the company's history on its website, Gallup's early polling led him to correctly predict that Franklin Roosevelt would win the 1936 presidential race, a conclusion that contradicted the nation's other polls, such as the Literary Digest. Gallup then began polling more extensively, doing global polls on political, personal, and sociological issues.[2]
The company spends most of its resources helping other corporations gain data and analyze it. In 2012, Bloomberg reported, "Corporations and organizations pay the firm to do everything from querying customers about new services they’d like to quizzing employees about how happy they are with their benefits. The flashier business of tracking the road to the Oval Office is a flyspeck in the company’s operations and means next to nothing to its bottom line."[3]
Leadership
As of August 2025, the following individuals were on Gallup's board of directors:[4]
- Jim Clifton, chair
- Reggie Van Lee
- Robin Renee Sanders
- Juan Carlos Pinzon
- Steven O'Brien
- Taek Lee
- Jim Krieger
- Vipula Gandhi
- Joe Daly
- Jon Clifton
As of August 2025, Jon Clifton is the CEO of Gallup.[4]
Work and activities
Polling activities
Gallup conducts custom polling and surveys for paid clients.[5] Starting in 2004, Gallup created the Gallup Panel, which serves as a "probability-based panel that is fully representative of the U.S. adult population."[6] Gallup uses the Gallup Panel to conduct opinion polling on a range of issues, such as healthcare, education, and the workplace.[7] The firm also conducts regular polling on the approval rating of the current president.[8][9] From 2008 to 2017, Gallup ran a daily tracking poll on American opinions about political and economic issues.[10]
Gallup uses different polling methodologies depending on the poll in question.[1] The Gallup Poll Social Series, a set of public opinion polls on a range of social, economic and political issues, continues to be conducted via telephone but other surveys use web or mail-based methods.[11][12]
According to the company's website, "Gallup weights samples to correct for unequal selection probability, nonresponse, and double coverage of landline and cellphone users in the two sampling frames. Gallup also weights its final samples to match the U.S. population according to gender, age, race, Hispanic ethnicity, education, region, population density, and phone status (cellphone only, landline only, both, and cellphone mostly)."[13]
Polling activity
2024
During the 2024 election cycle, Gallup published over 40 opinion polls on the presidential candidates, their favorability with voters, and on issues impacting the American public.[14] It also conducted polling about voter attitudes towards early voting and election administration.[15]
2020
Gallup's polling on the 2020 presidential election included candidate favorable ratings, the coronavirus pandemic, religion, and the economy.[16]
2016
In October 2015, Gallup announced that the firm would not conduct national polling in the presidential race after incorrectly projecting that Mitt Romney (R) would defeat Barack Obama (D) by 1 percentage point. Gallup Editor-in-Chief Frank Newport said the firm was focused instead on issue polling with some surveys on individual candidate favorability.[17]
Historical presidential projections, 1936-2012
Gallup's daily polling includes issues polling and presidential job approval polling. From 1936 to 2012, the company also did daily polls for presidential races. Gallup ceased polling for presidential races after the 2012 election, choosing to focus on issue polling rather than candidate preferences.[18]
The following table details Gallup's projections for presidential races from 1936 to 2012:
| Gallup presidential election projections, 1936-2012[19][20] | ||
|---|---|---|
| Election year | Projected winner | Actual winner |
| 1936 | Franklin D. Roosevelt | Franklin D. Roosevelt |
| 1940 | Franklin D. Roosevelt | Franklin D. Roosevelt |
| 1944 | Franklin D. Roosevelt | Franklin D. Roosevelt |
| 1948 | Thomas Dewey | Harry Truman |
| 1952 | Dwight Eisenhower | Dwight Eisenhower |
| 1956 | Dwight Eisenhower | Dwight Eisenhower |
| 1960 | John F. Kennedy | John F. Kennedy |
| 1964 | Lyndon Johnson | Lyndon Johnson |
| 1968 | Richard Nixon | Richard Nixon |
| 1972 | Richard Nixon | Richard Nixon |
| 1976 | Gerald Ford | Jimmy Carter |
| 1980 | Ronald Reagan | Ronald Reagan |
| 1984 | Ronald Reagan | Ronald Reagan |
| 1988 | George H.W. Bush | George H.W. Bush |
| 1992 | Bill Clinton | Bill Clinton |
| 1996 | Bill Clinton | Bill Clinton |
| 2000 | George W. Bush | George W. Bush |
| 2004 | Too close to call* | George W. Bush |
| 2008 | Barack Obama | Barack Obama |
| 2012 | Mitt Romney | Barack Obama |
| *Gallup polls indicated that both candidates had 49 percent of the vote. | ||
Notable endorsements
This section displays endorsements this organization made in elections within Ballotpedia's coverage scope. Know of one we missed? Click here to let us know.
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Gallup. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Gallup, "Methodology Center," accessed August 25, 2025
- ↑ Gallup, "Corporate History," archived January 6, 2010
- ↑ Bloomberg, "Right or Wrong, Gallup Always Wins," November 8, 2012
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Gallup, "Board of Directors," accessed August 25, 2025
- ↑ Gallup, "Global Analytics," accessed August 26, 2025
- ↑ Gallup, "Gallup Panel," accessed August 26, 2025
- ↑ Gallup, "Gallup Pulse," accessed August 26, 2025
- ↑ Gallup, "Independents Drive Trump's Approval to 37% Second-Term Low," July 24, 2025
- ↑ Gallup, "Presidential Job Approval Center," accessed August 26, 2025
- ↑ Gallup, "What was the Gallup U.S. Poll?" accessed August 26, 2025
- ↑ Gallup, "How Does the Gallup National Health and Well-Being Index Work?" accessed August 25, 2025
- ↑ Gallup, "Gallup Poll Methodology," January 25, 2024
- ↑ Gallup, "How Does Gallup Daily Tracking Work?" accessed October 17, 2017
- ↑ Gallup, "Election 2024," accessed August 26, 2025
- ↑ Gallup, "Americans Endorse Both Early Voting and Voter Verification," October 24, 2024
- ↑ Gallup, "Election 2020," accessed September 23, 2020
- ↑ Politico, "Gallup gives up the horse race," October 7, 2015
- ↑ Time, "Here's Why Gallup Won't Poll the 2016 Election," October 9, 2015
- ↑ Gallup, "Gallup Presidential Election Trial-Heat Trends, 1936-2008," accessed October 17, 2017
- ↑ The New York Times, "Which Polls Fared Best (and Worst) in the 2012 Presidential Race," November 10, 2012
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