Gov. Katie Hobbs [Funding: campaign funding data not verified], a Democrat, goes into Tuesday's election ahead of Republican Rep. Andy Biggs [Funding: tracked education-related PAC receipts $0.00 (2026 cycle; retrieved 2026-11-02; partial topic registry)] [FEC source] in every public October poll of the Arizona governor's race. The final poll from Phoenix firm Noble Predictive Insights (NPI), released Oct. 30, put Hobbs at 51% and Biggs at 45%. The same survey found Democrats ahead in the races for secretary of state and attorney general. Republican Kimberly Yee held a narrow lead in the race for superintendent of public instruction.
The polls show a clearer picture than Arizona had in 2022, when Hobbs won by less than a point. They also show a split electorate. Voters who said they had already cast a ballot favored Hobbs by 26 points, while those still planning to vote favored Biggs by 15. How many of the second group turn out on Tuesday will decide how wide the final margin is.
Our Arizona governor race page has candidate records and past results.
The NPI poll of record
NPI called this survey its "poll of record," part of its Arizona Public Opinion Pulse series. It interviewed 511 likely general election voters from Oct. 26 to 28 by text-to-online, meaning respondents got a text message with a link to an online survey. NPI weighted the sample by gender, county, age, party, race and ethnicity, education and recalled 2024 presidential vote. The margin of error is plus or minus 4.34 percentage points. NPI's release does not publish the exact wording of the ballot questions.
The results:
- Governor: Hobbs 51%, Biggs 45%, with 3% undecided.
- Secretary of state: Democrat Adrian Fontes [Funding: campaign funding data not verified] 50%, Republican Alexander Kolodin [Funding: campaign funding data not verified] 44%, with 5% undecided.
- Attorney general: Democrat Kris Mayes [Funding: campaign funding data not verified] 50%, Republican Warren Petersen [Funding: campaign funding data not verified] 46%, with 4% undecided.
- Superintendent of public instruction: Republican Kimberly Yee 48%, Democrat Teresa Leyba Ruiz 46%, with 5% undecided.
The 6-point governor's gap is larger than the 4.34-point margin, but the error on the gap between two candidates is roughly twice the stated margin. Even that lead is not statistically certain. The attorney general and superintendent races are closer still.
Independents drive the Democratic leads. Hobbs led independents 62% to 32%, Mayes led them 60% to 33% and Fontes led them 63% to 28%. Yee did better than the other Republicans, trailing Leyba Ruiz among independents only 51% to 41%.
Party loyalty was uneven. Hobbs held 94% of Democrats, while Biggs held 85% of Republicans. Hobbs also drew 9% of Republicans. "Biggs is winning most Republicans, but the defections matter in a state this competitive," said Mike Noble, NPI's founder and CEO.
Education produced the sharpest divide. College graduates favored Hobbs 62% to 33%. Voters without a degree favored Biggs 54% to 42%. Women backed Hobbs 54% to 42%, while men split 48% for Biggs to 47% for Hobbs. Subgroups carry larger margins of error than the full sample, so these splits are less precise than the toplines.
President Donald Trump [Funding: campaign funding data not verified]'s job approval in the poll was 44%, with 56% disapproving and 52% strongly disapproving. Independents disapproved 69% to 31%.
How other October polls compare
The Arizona Republic counted eight October polls of the governor's race, every one showing Hobbs ahead. Her lead ranged from 4 to 17 points. A simple average put Hobbs at 50% and Biggs at 42%, without adjusting for sample size or method. Several of the polls were paid for by partisan groups, which readers should weigh.
- Kreate Strategies, for American Encore, Oct. 25–27, 900 likely voters: Hobbs 48%, Biggs 43%. American Encore is a conservative group founded and run by Biggs' strategist, Sean Noble.
- HighGround, Oct. 21–25, 400 likely voters, margin of error 4.9 points: Hobbs 51%, Biggs 39%. Its Oct. 6–8 poll had Hobbs 51%, Biggs 34%. The Republic describes HighGround as Republican-leaning. MS NOW reported the firm has worked for a group funding ads attacking Biggs.
- GrayHouse, a Republican firm, paid for by GOP treasurer candidate Elijah Norton, Oct. 18–20, margin of error 4.2 points: Hobbs 51%, Biggs 45%. Its Oct. 6–8 poll had Hobbs 50%, Biggs 44%.
- Wick, Oct. 3–6, 1,513 likely voters, margin of error 2.6 points: Hobbs 49%, Biggs 43%.
- Hobbs campaign internal, Sept. 30–Oct. 4, 600 likely voters, margin of error 4 points: Hobbs 49%, Biggs 45%. Campaign polls released to the public are chosen by the campaign, so they deserve extra caution.
Third-party candidates Teri Hourihan of No Labels and Risa Lombardo of the Green Party polled in the low single digits where they were included.
The pattern matters more than any one poll. Surveys paid for by Republican-aligned sponsors showed Hobbs ahead by 5 or 6 points, and so did NPI's independent poll. That agreement across sponsors makes a Hobbs lead more credible. It does not make the size of the lead certain. In 2022, most final polls showed Republican Kari Lake ahead, and Hobbs won. Our methodology page explains how we weigh polls.
Forecasters have moved toward Hobbs. The Cook Political Report shifted the race from Lean Democrat to Likely Democrat on Oct. 29. Sabato's Crystal Ball made the same move on Oct. 27. Inside Elections rates it as tilting Democratic.
type: column
title: Arizona governor polls of likely voters, Oct. 10 to 30, 2026
note: Percent of likely voters, by release date listed by 270toWin. Undecided voters and other candidates are not shown. A registered-voter poll by BSP Research is left out. The polls used different methods and are not averaged here.
suffix: %
source: [270toWin Arizona governor polls](https://www.270towin.com/2026-governor-polls/arizona)
---
Poll | Hobbs | Biggs
Grayhouse (Oct. 10) | 50 | 44
Wick (Oct. 13) | 49 | 43
HighGround (Oct. 13) | 51 | 34
HighGround (Oct. 27) | 52 | 39
Noble Predictive Insights (Oct. 30) | 51 | 45
Early voting
Most Arizonans vote early. As of Oct. 30, 1,541,187 early ballots had been returned, about 46.5% of the 3,315,699 issued, according to data from Stealth Analytics reported by 12News. Registered Republicans returned 585,570, or 38%. Democrats returned 575,936, or 37.4%. Independent and other voters returned 379,681, or 24.6%.
Those figures show party registration, not votes. NPI's finding that independents lean toward the Democrats means a small Republican edge in returned ballots does not translate into a Republican lead.
The NPI gap between early voters and later voters is the key point. Voters can drop off early ballots until 7 p.m. on Tuesday, and those ballots must be processed after the ones already received. If NPI is right that the not-yet-voted group leans Republican, the first returns Tuesday night may favor Democrats and later counts may move toward Republicans.
The money
Hobbs has a large advantage in her own campaign money. State reports through Sept. 30 show her campaign spent about $17.8 million, compared with about $5.3 million for Biggs. Their cash on hand was closer, at about $672,000 for Hobbs and $507,000 for Biggs.
Outside money narrows the gap. The Republic reported that the Democratic Governors Association spent more than $20 million to help Hobbs through mid-October. On the Republican side, Turning Point Action, the political arm of Turning Point USA, has spent more than $18 million since June to help Biggs. Republican Leadership for Arizona, a PAC largely funded by the Club for Growth, spent more than $3.8 million.
In the down-ballot races, NPI reported that Mayes had about $1 million in cash entering October to Petersen's $250,000. Fontes had about $713,000 to Kolodin's $420,000. Yee had about $259,000 to Leyba Ruiz's $237,000.
These are state campaign finance figures. Federal FEC records for Biggs cover his U.S. House committee, not his governor's race. Spending shows who is investing in a race. It does not show that donors control a candidate.
The case for Andy Biggs [Funding: tracked education-related PAC receipts $0.00 (2026 cycle; retrieved 2026-11-02; partial topic registry)] [FEC source]
Biggs, a five-term congressman and former chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, has made cost of living his lead issue. His central proposal is to eliminate Arizona's 2.5% flat income tax. The tax brings in about a third of the state budget, roughly $5.7 billion, KJZZ reported, citing legislative budget analysts. Biggs says he would phase it out and that growth would make up the money. "As we manage it and we incrementally bring this down you're going to see more economic activity which is going to result in more tax revenue coming into the state," he said on Sept. 22. He also promised to cut "waste, fraud and abuse."
He has also attacked Hobbs on water. Arizona faces federally imposed cuts of up to 77% to its Colorado River supply in 2028 if the seven basin states cannot reach a deal. "Katie Hobbs has failed to secure our water future, and her flip-flopping on this deal won't fix anything," his campaign said after Hobbs joined Nevada's lawsuit against the federal government. [Funding: campaign funding data not verified]
Biggs has pledged to protect and expand Empowerment Scholarship Accounts, the state's school voucher program, which pays for private school tuition or homeschooling materials. He wants to raise awards for students in rural and low-income urban areas. "To say that you have school choice when you really don't have school choice is a misnomer," he said. He has also argued that a second Hobbs term could let her appoint as many as three state Supreme Court justices, and called her judicial picks "radical left-wing activists."
On elections, Biggs said at an early October debate that Hobbs skipped that he would accept this year's results and would be "happy to certify" them, MS NOW reported. His campaign has focused on Hobbs' record, a spokesperson told The Washington Post.
The case for Katie Hobbs [Funding: campaign funding data not verified]
Hobbs has run on her first-term programs. The Capitol Times listed down payment help for first-time homebuyers, medical debt relief, utility bill relief and shorter child care waitlists. She has not made a specific new promise on affordability.
On water, her office argues that Biggs did little on the issue in Congress. "For the last decade in Congress, Andy Biggs has been completely MIA on Arizona's water security," said Christian Slater, her communications director. Hobbs has tried several times, without success, to add guardrails to the voucher program, which costs taxpayers about $1 billion a year. [Funding: tracked education-related PAC receipts $0.00 (2026 cycle; retrieved 2026-11-02; partial topic registry)] [FEC source]
Her closing argument centers on the 2028 election. Biggs backed a 2020 lawsuit asking the Supreme Court to throw out Joe Biden's wins in four states, and voted on Jan. 6, 2021, to reject Arizona's and Pennsylvania's electoral votes, MS NOW reported. The governor signs Arizona's certification of presidential results. In 2020, MS NOW recounted, a call from Trump rang on Republican Gov. Doug Ducey's phone as he signed it, with Hobbs, then secretary of state, beside him. "If Andy Biggs is governor, then Arizona is the first swing state that has an election denier in charge," Hobbs told MS NOW. [Funding: campaign funding data not verified] [Funding: tracked education-related PAC receipts $0.00 (2026 cycle; retrieved 2026-11-02; partial topic registry)] [FEC source]
Her running mate, former Mesa Mayor John Giles, is a former Republican who left the party. "I do feel like the Republican Party has changed, in particular, in not positive ways over the last few years," he told MS NOW.
The down-ballot races
The secretary of state, who runs Arizona's elections, and the attorney general join the governor at the certification of presidential results. MS NOW reported that Kolodin promoted false claims that the 2020 election was stolen and that the State Bar of Arizona placed him on probation over his role in a 2020 lawsuit. Petersen, the state Senate president, oversaw the Senate's 2020 audit of Maricopa County and turned its records over to the FBI this year under a grand jury subpoena.
That record appeals to part of the Republican base. "There's been shenanigans going on, and that's why we're supporting Alex Kolodin," Gary Olson, a Pima County Republican Party volunteer, told MS NOW. The 2020 suits Kolodin worked on were dismissed, and Fontes, who was Maricopa County recorder in 2020, is seeking a second term. Federal action on Arizona voter registration groups is covered in our earlier report on the U.S. attorney's probe of registration drives. [Funding: campaign funding data not verified]
Yee, the state treasurer, is the only Republican statewide candidate leading in the NPI poll. "She is getting more support from Independents than Biggs, Kolodin, or Petersen," Noble said.
Checking the claims
Both campaigns have made claims that need context.
Hobbs' campaign said in an Oct. 20 fundraising post that she was being outspent "3-to-1," the Republic reported. State reports do not support that. Her campaign outspent Biggs' by more than 3 to 1. Even counting the outside groups listed above, spending on her behalf exceeds spending for Biggs. Her campaign did not answer the Republic's questions about the claim.
At a Casa Grande rally, Punchbowl News reported, Hobbs said there was "no guarantee" Biggs would not take a call like Trump's to Ducey in 2028. That claim is hard to test. No one can prove a future act will not happen. That makes it an argument from ignorance. Biggs' 2020 actions are documented and relevant, and voters can weigh them. They do not prove what he would do in 2028.
Biggs' description of Hobbs' judicial appointees as "radical left-wing activists" is a loaded label. He has not, in the reporting we reviewed, named rulings that support it.
His income-tax plan rests on a disputed forecast. Biggs says growth and cuts to waste would replace about $5.7 billion a year without new taxes or service cuts. Critics say one or the other would be needed. KJZZ noted that the federal deficit rose after the 2017 federal tax cuts. "Waste, fraud and abuse" is not a specific list of cuts, so voters cannot yet check whether the numbers add up.
What to watch
Polls close at 7 p.m. Arizona time on Tuesday, which is 9 p.m. Eastern. The first results will mostly be early ballots counted before Election Day. Ballots dropped off on Tuesday take longer to process, and Arizona counts often take days. For more on Hobbs and Biggs, see their profiles: Katie Hobbs [Funding: campaign funding data not verified] and Andy Biggs [Funding: tracked education-related PAC receipts $0.00 (2026 cycle; retrieved 2026-11-02; partial topic registry)] [FEC source].