Voters cast their ballots on Sunday in the second round of elections that will decide who runs France's biggest cities. Beyond selecting local mayors and councillors, the polls could give clues which way French voters are leaning – and what deals parties are prepared to do – ahead of a presidential election next year.
Most of France's roughly 35,000 communes elected their local councils last weekend in the first round of the municipal elections, held nationwide every six years.
But in districts where the race is more competitive, including most big cities, the elections go to a second round this Sunday.
The week between the two rounds is crucial: it's when parties decide whether to run together, to drop out and throw their weight behind an ally, or to go it alone.
With the deadline to finalise lists now passed, we now know the shape the second round will take – and it could set the scene for France's presidential vote, just over a year away.
"These elections are completely different, if only in terms of voter turnout," said Frédéric Dabi, head of polling institute Ifop, who cautioned against direct comparisons with national elections.
"But there's still an effect," he told RFI. "It creates momentum, it provides a boost, and it establishes a narrative."
Low turnout and far-right gains mark first round of France's local elections
Left's battle to hold Paris
One of the fiercest battles is for Paris, which the centre-left Socialist Party has run for the past 25 years.
With Socialist mayor Anne Hidalgo retiring, the right has an opportunity to claim the capital. Its candidate, former culture minister Rachida Dati, came second in the first round with 25.46 percent, while the Socialists' Emmanuel Grégoire led on 37.98 percent.
Candidates from the hard left, centre and far right also won more than 10 percent each, putting them through to the second round.
Since then, however, far-right candidate Sarah Knafo has strategically dropped out and centrist Pierre-Yves Bournazel has merged his list with Dati's, potentially uniting voters on the right.
Dati also has the support of the head of the far-right National Rally (RN) party, Jordan Bardella, who said he would back her against the "existential threat" posed by the left.
There is no such alliance on the left, with Grégoire refusing to team up with Sophia Chikirou of hard-left France Unbowed (LFI). The party has been shunned by much of the mainstream left amid accusations of antisemitism, extremism and violence.
That leaves Grégoire in a three-way race against Chikirou and Dati. If Knafo and Bournazel's voters throw their support behind Dati, it would overtake the Socialists' first-round lead – and prove the potential of a broad right-wing alliance.
France's local elections: who are the contenders in the battle for Paris?
RN eyes Marseille
France's second-biggest city is a test case for whether the National Rally can win over urban voters in big numbers.
The party is in close second place in Marseille, its candidate Franck Allisio taking 35.02 percent in the first round compared to 36.70 percent for incumbent left-wing mayor Benoît Payan.
Winning the city would be a major coup for the RN, which until now has governed only small and mid-sized towns.
Payan ruled out forming a united front with France Unbowed – which came in fourth – to block the far right. But on Tuesday LFI's Sébastien Delogu withdrew from the race, slamming Payan's "irresponsibility and sectarianism" but saying the ascent of the RN represented a greater threat.
Meanwhile third-place candidate Martine Vassal, running for the right-wing Republicans (LR), remains in the race despite the National Rally calling on her to pull out.
France’s parity law boosts female candidates, but most mayors are still men
Far-right momentum
While Marseille represents the biggest prize, the National Rally – as of 2024, France's single largest party in parliament – has other gains in sight.
It stands to get a foothold in Nice, France's fifth-biggest city, via a partnership with Eric Ciotti, the conservative politician who led the Republicans until the party ousted him for proposing to ally with the RN in 2024's snap parliamentary elections.
Ciotti is standing in Nice as a joint candidate for his own splinter party, the UDR, and the National Rally – and is ahead of the outgoing centre-right mayor Christian Estrosi by more than 12 points after the first round.
Tellingly, the new head of the Republicans, Bruno Retailleau, refused to throw his weight behind Estrosi after what he said was a "damaging" campaign.
Some in the UDR have taken it as Retailleau laying the groundwork for an alliance in next year's presidential poll – a shift that would sound the knell for the cordon sanitaire that has historically kept France's mainstream parties from partnering with the far right.
The RN has a similar lead in the southern city of Toulon, where voters elected the far right once before in 1995. It is competing against two other lists from the more mainstream right, which have not merged to block it.
Yet alliances aren't the only factor that can shift second-round results. Seeing the RN out in front has historically mobilised voters who oppose them – including people who didn't take part in the first round.
That effect could be decisive in districts where the party has only a marginal lead, such as the city of Nîmes.
Hard-left dilemma
Where once the far right was viewed as the ultimate threat, these elections have seen the hard left emerge as the faction to be stopped at any cost.
One survey released at the end of February found 63 percent of voters polled said they would try to keep France Unbowed out of power by voting for its rivals in the second round, compared to 45 percent who said they would seek to block the National Rally.
That sentiment has produced some unlikely unions. In Strasbourg, the Socialist Party frontrunner Catherine Trautmann has merged her list with a centrist ally of President Emmanuel Macron to face off against a coalition between LFI and the Greens – a move that earned her a rebuke from her party's leadership.
In Lille, meanwhile, the Greens and the Socialists are teaming up to try and block LFI, whose candidate came in a close second to the Socialist incumbent in the first round.
Extremes pose danger to France, warns Macron before final vote for mayoral slots
Elsewhere, however, the mainstream left is taking a pragmatic approach after France Unbowed qualified for a record number of second-round races. The Socialists refused to run a joint campaign with LFI, but didn't rule out striking local alliances between the two rounds – which it has now done in cities including Avignon, Brest and Nantes.
In Lyon, where the death of a far-right student last month during a fight with anti-fascist activists contributed to the backlash against LFI, the party narrowly made it through to the second round behind the incumbent Greens and their challengers on the centre-right.
France Unbowed has since secured a merger with the left-wing list – a move that risks alienating some moderates. One centre-left voter told RFI she planned to cast a blank ballot: "I'll be in a real bind in the second round... I can’t vote for someone who allies themselves with people I consider extremists."
How did Lyon become France's capital of political violence?
The balance of power was flipped in France's fourth city Toulouse, where LFI came in ahead of the Socialists and their allies the Greens, making it the primary challenger to the centre-right frontrunners. The left has since merged to head into the second round with a single list.
In the northern city of Roubaix, LFI even came close to winning the first round outright. It goes into the second without the need for partners, the centre-left list having come in in distant third.
