University of North Florida
Graded against the actual result across 17 races (from 22 polls, through 2024).
Head-to-head vs VotePredictor Elections
The fair, apples-to-apples test: on the 17 races University of North Florida actually polled, how its final poll's margin compared to what VotePredictor Elections predicted for those same races.
| Model | Avg miss (pts) | Called right |
|---|---|---|
| University of North Florida | 5.05 | 59% |
| VotePredictor Elections | 2.39 | 77% |
VotePredictor Elections aggregates all the pollsters, so it's expected to beat any single one on margin — that's the value of averaging. The honest comparison among forecasters is on the combined board.
Every race (17)
Each race University of North Florida polled, scored on its final poll — the call right before the vote — against the actual Dem−Rep result. Click a race for its full detail.
| Race | Their call | Result | Miss | Call |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 FL-4 House | R+7.0 | R+14.5 | 7.5 | ✓ |
| 2022 FL Governor | R+14.0 | R+19.4 | 5.4 | ✓ |
| 2022 FL-4 House | R+12.0 | R+20.9 | 8.9 | ✓ |
| 2022 FL Senate | R+11.0 | R+16.4 | 5.4 | ✓ |
| 2020 FL-4 House | R+19.0 | R+22.2 | 3.2 | ✓ |
| 2020 FL President | D+1.0 | R+3.4 | 4.4 | ✗ |
| 2018 FL Governor | D+6.0 | R+0.4 | 6.4 | ✗ |
| 2018 FL-16 House | R+9.0 | R+9.1 | 0.1 | ✓ |
| 2018 FL Senate | D+1.0 | R+0.1 | 1.1 | ✗ |
| 2016 FL-13 House | D+18.0 | D+3.8 | 14.2 | ✓ |
| 2016 FL President | D+4.0 | R+1.2 | 5.2 | ✗ |
| 2016 FL Senate | R+6.0 | R+7.7 | 1.7 | ✓ |
| 2014 FL Governor | D+5.0 | R+1.1 | 6.1 | ✗ |
| 2012 FL President | D+4.0 | D+0.9 | 3.1 | ✓ |
| 2012 FL Senate | D+10.0 | D+13.0 | 3.0 | ✓ |
| 2004 FL President | D+1.0 | R+5.0 | 6.0 | ✗ |
| 2004 FL Senate | D+3.0 | R+1.1 | 4.1 | ✗ |
Accuracy by time to election
Lower is better. Time to election runs right (election week) to left (~2 months out).
By the numbers
| Time to election | Polls | Avg miss | vs field | Called right |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1–3 wk | 9 | 5.11 | +0.05 | 56% |
| 3–6 wk | 11 | 4.91 | -0.79 | 55% |
vs field is this pollster's average miss minus all pollsters' at the same lead time — green beats the field, redtrails it. Our historical polls reach ~2 months out; earlier polling isn't in the record.
Track record by cycle — getting better?
| Year | Polls | Avg miss | Lean (house effect) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | 5 | 5.2 | D+5.2 |
| 2018 | 5 | 2.4 | D+2.4 |
| 2020 | 3 | 5.6 | D+5.6 |
| 2022 | 3 | 6.6 | D+6.6 |
Do we credit a pollster for fixing its bias? Each cycle, the model re-estimates every pollster's lean from all its earlier polls (walk-forward) and subtracts it before using the poll. We tested weighting recent cycles more — it doesn't help: a pollster's lean in one cycle barely predicts the next (correlation 0.28), so the swings above are mostly noise, and averaging over more history beats chasing the latest cycle. The all-time estimate we use came out within ~0.5% of the best option.