Key takeaways from the 2025 German election results

Friedrich Merz has heralded a new era for Germany, after the German elections revealed a majority of young voters are leaning towards the far-right. Will things look any different when the aftershocks settle?

Friedrich Merz, chancellor candidate of Germany’s Christian Democrats after German elections
(Image credit: Maja Hitij/Getty Images)

Three things emerged clearly from Germany’s general election, says The Economist.

First, the opposition conservative Christian Democrats (CDU), along with their Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU), won a definite if “underwhelming” victory with 29% of the vote.

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Emily Hohler
Politics editor

Emily has worked as a journalist for more than thirty years and was formerly Assistant Editor of MoneyWeek, which she helped launch in 2000. Prior to this, she was Deputy Features Editor of The Times and a Commissioning Editor for The Independent on Sunday and The Daily Telegraph. She has written for most of the national newspapers including The Times, the Daily and Sunday Telegraph, The Evening Standard and The Daily Mail, She interviewed celebrities weekly for The Sunday Telegraph and wrote a regular column for The Evening Standard. As Political Editor of MoneyWeek, Emily has covered subjects from Brexit to the Gaza war.

Aside from her writing, Emily trained as Nutritional Therapist following her son's diagnosis with Type 1 diabetes in 2011 and now works as a practitioner for Nature Doc, offering one-to-one consultations and running workshops in Oxfordshire.