The exit poll for this year’s General Election will be published just after polling stations close later today, Thursday 4 July.

Exit polls take place at about 144 polling stations across the country, with tens of thousands of people asked to privately fill in a replica ballot as they leave, to get an indication of how they voted.

But what is the exit poll? Its purpose is to predict the number of seats each party will win.

The poll – commissioned by Sky News, BBC and ITV News – is designed by an academic team of political scientists, led by Professor Sir John Curtice of Strathclyde University, and is carried out by the research company Ipsos.

Curtice told the PA news agency: “Wherever possible we go back to the same places as last time. The method of the exit poll is that you compare the results in the selected polling stations this time, with the results of the exit poll last time.”

As well as the identical ballots, a replica ballot box is used as part of the process;  Sir John said it’s done in this way to “maximise the confidentiality of people’s votes”.

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He added: “To ask them to tell an interviewer, then they might be reluctant to do that, so you’re trying to minimise the level of refusal, which is always an issue.”

The number of people approached at a polling station is known as a “systematic sample”, Sir John said, and the size of the samples varies according to the registered electorate for that area.

When is the exit poll published?

The projection will be broadcast when the polls close at 10pm on Thursday 4 July.