Electoral lists are part of the electoral offer directly presented to a given voter. Most often, they do not contain all the possibilities (e.g. they do not include all candidates, but only candidates registered in a given constituency). The electoral lists of all parties (or a list of candidates) are presented to the voter on the ballot card, which he uses to make his choice.

There are several types of electoral lists:

• Closed lists: if this form is used, the voter can only vote for the list of the selected formation (party) as a whole. He cannot indicate his preference for a specific candidate from this list. As a rule, when this type of list is used, mandates (within a given list) are allocated in accordance with the order in which the candidates were placed on the list. This form of list was used to divide seats between the so-called "national lists" in the elections to the Sejm of the Republic of Poland until 1997.
• Open lists: if this form is used, the voter has the opportunity to vote for the list of the selected formation (party) as a whole and to indicate a specific, preferred candidate within this list. As a rule, when this type of list is used, seats (within a given list) are allocated in the order of the number of votes obtained by individual candidates. Such lists are currently used in all elections in Poland conducted using proportional representation formulas.
• Free lists: when this form is used, the voter has the opportunity to create his or her own combination from among the submitted candidates, even from different lists (creates his or her own list), often creating his or her own ranking of candidates (marking the most preferred candidate with number 1, the second most preferred candidate with number 2, etc.) . Such lists are used, among others, in the single transferable voice (STV) system, which is, however, not used in Poland.

Maciej Onasz, based on: Onasz Maciej, Electoral engineering in Poland since 1989, Łódź 2017.