High School Students
In Florida, you can pre-register to vote starting at age 16 and on your 18th birthday, you will be eligible to vote. We partner with Hillsborough County Public Schools and visit high schools every semester to help students get ready to vote – but you don't have to wait for us. To pre-register to vote, visit RegisterToVoteFlorida.gov and fill out a voter registration application. If you have a Florida driver license or ID, you'll be able to complete your registration online. Otherwise, you'll need to print the application and submit it to our office.
If you're 18 and have already registered to vote, look yourself up and make sure all of your information is up to date.
College Students
Florida law requires that voters register to vote at least 29 days before an election to vote in that election. Once you're registered to vote in Florida, you do not have to register again but you do need to keep your information up to date. If you move to a different county in Florida, or a different address within your Florida county, you can update your address any time, even on Election Day.
If you're a college student living away from home, you have a decision to make. You may register to vote using your campus residential address or your family's residential address – whichever you consider to be your permanent address at the time. You may only be registered and vote in one location. Your residential address determines the voting districts you live in and the races that will be on your ballot.
When you register to vote or make an update to your voter information, you can provide us with a different mailing address, if needed. Here's why a mailing address may be important. If you won't be at your residential address during an election, you can submit a Vote By Mail ballot request and we will send your ballots to the mailing address you have on file.
Keep in mind that your Vote By Mail request must be submitted to the elections office where you're registered to vote. For example, if you go to college in Miami and you registered using your residential address in Hillsborough County, you are a Hillsborough County voter. You can request your ballot from our office and we'll send it to your mailing address in Miami. If you go to college in Tampa, but registered using your family's residential address in St. Pete, you cannot request your ballot from our office. In that case, you're a Pinellas County voter and you need to request your ballot from Pinellas County.
For more information on registering to vote in Florida, visit our Registering to Vote page.
For more information on voting by mail, visit our Vote By Mail page.