The conservative Christian Democrats have won Germany’s national election, putting them on track to lead the next coalition government, according to provisional results.

The outcome means the party’s leader, Friedrich Merz, will likely be Germany’s next chancellor.

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Here’s a breakdown of the election results and what to expect from Germany’s next leadership:

What were the key outcomes of the German election?

Conservative and right-wing parties emerged on top. The mainstream conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU), along with its partner, the Christian Social Union (CSU), finished first with 28.6 percent of the vote, while the far-right, anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) surged into second with 20.8 percent, according to provisional results announced by election authorities.

The Social Democratic Party (SPD) came in third with just 16.4 percent, a nearly 10-point drop from their first-place finish in 2021. Outgoing Chancellor Olaf Scholz acknowledged a “bitter” defeat, saying “the election result is poor and I bear responsibility”.

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Germany’s Greens and the far-left Die Linke, or The Left, party exceeded the 5 percent threshold to secure seats in parliament, with 11.6 percent and 8.8 percent, respectively.

As a result, the CDU/CSU partnership is projected to secure 208 seats in the Bundestag, the German parliament, the AfD 152, the SPD 120, the Greens 85 and The Left 64.

Who is Friedrich Merz, Germany’s likely next Chancellor?

The 69-year-old CDU leader is a multimillionaire lawyer who has been in and out of politics for decades. He was first elected to the European Parliament in 1989, and by 2000 had become chairman of the CDU’s parliamentary alliance.

However, fellow party member Angela Merkel eventually pushed Merz aside, and he left parliament in 2009 to jump into the private sector, working for multinational companies like Mayer Brown and BlackRock Germany. Merz was re-elected leader of the CDU in 2022 after Merkel retired from politics following her 16-year-long stint as the country’s chancellor.

A social conservative who has broached the idea of a new European defence coalition, Merz says he plans to govern Germany “reliably” and push for European “independence” from the United States.

“That is my absolute priority, I have no illusions at all about what will come out of America,” Merz said on Sunday, amid growing public differences between European leaders and US President Donald Trump over Ukraine and US security cover for Europe.

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Soon after his party’s victory on Monday, Merz went on to pledge that Europe will “remain firmly by” Ukraine, which he said must be play a role in any peace negotiations.

Why is AfD’s result significant?

The far-right party finished just after Merz’s CDU, with 20.8 percent of the vote, double their 2021 support. It is projected to win 152 seats in parliament. That marks the strongest showing by a far-right movement in Germany since the end of World War II.

The AfD’s rise highlights its growing populist appeal among voters who are critical of immigration and the European Union, especially in eastern Germany, where it outperformed all other parties.

Despite little chance of the AfD being invited into a coalition, the party, led by 46-year-old Alice Weidel, is celebrating what it believes to be a victory, positioning a once-fringe force firmly in the mainstream of Europe’s right wing.

The results are also expected to further strengthen the AfD’s clout in the German parliament, where it scored a big win in January when Merz and the CDU — for all of their talk of not allying with the far-right party — turned to Weidel’s group for votes to push through a bill calling for tougher restrictions on immigration.

Who else made big gains?

The Left won 8.8 percent of the vote, nearly doubling its share from the last election. It performed especially well in the capital, Berlin, surpassing all parties with 19.9 percent of the vote. That puts it on track to win 64 seats in the Bundestag.

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The Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW), a populist left-wing party formed last year after a split with The Left, took 4.97 percent of the vote. That was just shy of the 5 percent hurdle needed to take seats in the Bundestag, meaning larger parties would get more seats.

How did other parties perform?

The Social Democrats’ two outgoing coalition partners – the environmentalist Greens and the pro-business Federal Democratic Party (FDP) – also took a hit in the elections.

The Greens won 11.6 percent of the vote, a 3 percent drop from the 2021 elections. The party’s chancellor candidate, Robert Habeck, conceded it was “not a good a result” and said he would no longer seek a leading role in the party.

The FDP, which effectively triggered the snap election by abandoning the coalition over a budget dispute, fared worse, getting just 4.3 percent of the vote. Since the party did not win any constituencies, and its national vote is below the 5 percent threshold required to hold seats in parliament allocated through proportional representation, it is projected to lose all 91 seats it has held since 2021.

As its poor result became clear, leader Christian Lindner announced he would leave active politics.

“The German election brought defeat for the FDP, but hopefully a new start for Germany. This is what I fought for,” he said in a post on X.

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What’s next and could the AfD be in government?

Merz will now begin the tough task of forming a coalition government. To do so, he needs to shore up at least 316 seats in the 630-member Bundestag.

He has ruled out working with the far-right AfD, saying they have “fundamentally different views”, despite joining hands with the party in January over the immigration bill. That means his best bet is likely a two-way alliance with the SPD, which would come out to 328 seats.

The CDU/CSU and the SPD have ruled through so-called grand coalitions four times in the past — between 1966 and 1969 in West Germany, and thrice since reunification, under Merkel’s chancellorship.

A three-way partnership with the Greens and The Left would likely require more concessions from Merz’s centrist CDU and be more fragile. The Greens support higher taxes on the wealthy and renewable energy, while Merz favours corporate tax cuts and nuclear energy. The Left also backs higher taxes for the rich and advocates laxer immigration policies, conflicting with Merz’s stance to curb immigration and ramp up deportations.

The composition of the next government is also likely to influence the foreign policy stances that Merz, who aims for Germany to play a leading role in European affairs and help unite the continent, can adopt.

“If it winds up being a coalition with two parties – with Merz and CDU, and the centre-left – that puts him [Merz] in a stronger position,” global strategy adviser Marco Vicenzino told Al Jazeera. “If it has to go into a three-party coalition, it gets into a weaker position.”

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With major defense challenges facing Europe, particularly due to the war in Ukraine, the European Union’s foreign policy chief urged German parties to form a coalition quickly

“I hope that they do it as fast as possible, because we really need to move on with the decisions also on the European level that require German participation,” said Kaja Kalla.

Merz said he hoped to form a new government by Easter, April 20, 2025.

What has the AfD said about its ‘win’?

Party leaders have hailed AfD’s performance and argued it should be represented in the next coalition government.

“We have achieved something historic today,” AfD co-leader Tino Chrupalla said to cheering supporters on Sunday. “We are now the political centre and we have left the fringes behind us.”

Weidel said the party remains open to joining a coalition and claimed that if Merz partners with left-wing parties instead, that would be “electoral fraud”. If that happens, she added, “next time we’ll come first”.