Editing Voting machine (section)

{{Short description|Machine used to vote in elections}}
{{Distinguish|Political machine}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=June 2023}}
{{Use American English|date = March 2019}}
{{Electiontech}}

A '''voting machine''' is a machine used to record votes in an election without paper. The first voting machines were mechanical but it is increasingly more common to use ''[[electronic voting machine]]s''.  Traditionally, a voting machine has been defined by its mechanism, and whether the system tallies votes at each voting location, or centrally. Voting machines should not be confused with [[tabulating machine]]s, which count votes done by paper [[ballot]].

Voting machines differ in usability, security, cost, speed, accuracy, and ability of the public to oversee elections. Machines may be more or less accessible to voters with different disabilities.

Tallies are simplest in [[parliamentary system]]s where just one choice is on the ballot, and these are often tallied manually. In other political systems where many choices are on the same ballot, tallies are often done by machines to give faster results.