Winning the most votes and providing Germany's next chancellor — the conservative Union of the Christian Democrats (CDU) and its Bavarian sister party the Christian Social Union (CSU) has achieved this goal. "We won the 2025 federal election," enthused Friedrich Merz, CDU leader and the Union's chancellor candidate, on election night in Berlin.

The celebrations at party headquarters were muted, however. The conservatives had expected a much better result: "30% plus X," as they said on the campaign trail.

In the end, they secured about 28% of the vote — not enough to govern alone under Germany's electoral system. The CDU/CSU will need to find coalition partners to form the required majority.

Looking purely at the numbers, the second-place Alternative for Germany (AfD) could be an option. One in five German voters chose the populist party, parts of which are considered right-wing extremist.

"We have doubled! They wanted to halve us, but the opposite has happened," triumphed AfD co-leader Alice Weidel on Sunday, after the results were revealed. According to Weidel, the CDU and CSU would only be able to fulfill their election promises, such as ending irregular migration, by working with the AfD.

However, during the election campaign, the CDU/CSU categorically ruled out forming a coalition government with the AfD. "We have fundamental differences of opinion, for example in foreign policy, in security policy, in many other areas, on the topics of Europe, NATO and the euro currency," reiterated Merz on Sunday.

"You can hold out your hand as much as you like," he told Weidel, who in turn threatened that, as the largest opposition force, the AfD would put pressure on the government. "We will hound the others, so they make sensible policies for our country," she said.

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