The first major estimates from the European Union parliamentary elections have suggested far-right parties have made gains in Germany and Austria.
The exit poll in Germany indicated that the Alternative for Germany, or AfD, rose to 16.5 per cent from 11 per cent in 2019 beating the Social Democratic party of Chancellor Olaf Scholz, which fell to 14 per cent.
The combined result for the three parties in the German governing coalition barely topped 30 per cent, with the Greens taking heavy losses.
The poll comes on the heels of major gains for the far right in the Netherlands, where the party of Geert Wilders is in a neck-and-neck race with a Socialist-Green alliance.
In Austria, the far-right Freedom Party has possibly won the European Parliament election for the first time, according to a polling-based "trend forecast" for Austrian broadcasters and news agency APA published when polls closed on Sunday.
The war in Ukraine, migration, and the impact of climate policy on farmers are some of the issues weighing on voters' minds as they cast ballots to elect 720 members of the European Parliament.
Surveys suggest that mainstream and pro-European parties will retain their majority in parliament but they will lose seats to hard-right parties like those led by Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni, Hungarian leader Viktor Orban, Geert Wilders in the Netherlands and Marine Le Pen in France.
That would make it harder for Europe to pass legislation and could paralyse decision-making across the bloc of 450 million citizens.
EU lawmakers have a say in issues from financial rules to climate and agriculture policy.
They approve the EU budget, which bankrolls priorities including infrastructure projects, farm subsidies and aid delivered to Ukraine. And they hold a veto over appointments to the powerful EU commission.
Sunday's voting marathon winds up a four-day election cycle that began in the Netherlands on Thursday.
An unofficial exit poll there suggested that Wilders' anti-migrant hard right party would make important gains in the Netherlands, even though a coalition of pro-European parties has probably pushed it into second place.
