A total of 53 citizen-initiated ballot measures were certified for the 2026 ballot in 15 states. Proponents of citizen-initiated ballot measures—including veto referendums, initiated state statutes, and initiated constitutional amendments—collect petition signatures from a certain minimum number of registered voters in a state. For 2026, the average signature validity rate (the number of signatures deemed valid out of the raw total number of submitted signatures) was 77.96%.
In total, campaigns for the 53 initiatives needed to gather 11,578,713 valid signatures to qualify the measures for the ballot. The average number of required signatures to qualify a measure for the ballot was 218,466.
The initiative that required the smallest number of signatures was Alaska Ballot Measure 1; the campaign needed to submit 26,705 valid signatures to place the measure on the ballot. The initiatives that required the greatest number of signatures were the five initiated constitutional amendments in California. For 2026, 874,641 signatures were required to place an initiated constitutional amendment on the California ballot.
