A scientific look at how
GE2025 played out online

Published on November 28, 2025

Having crossed the six-month mark of this year’s general election, and with the 15th Parliament in full swing, we feel it is timely to look back on how we got here.

During the general election period in April and May, AsiaOne's consumer insights and analytics team gathered and analysed 647,585 online comments related to the general election across five social networks and 116 verified social media accounts of the candidates, accredited media, alternative news media and relevant online communities. This helped us scientifically understand the online discourse and chatter, how the winds were blowing and how to shape our coverage.

This trove of data proved fascinating, and we felt it would be a disservice to not share our findings. 

What were the issues that resonated with voters? How did the battleground constituencies play out? Did online sentiments translate to the outcome?

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Elected Seats

Under the leadership of the new prime minister Lawrence Wong, the incumbent People’s Action Party (PAP) received strong support from the electorate, winning 87 of the 97 seats. While the opposition as a whole did not win new constituencies, the Workers’ Party (WP) in particular improved its vote share in two of the three wards it held. Where WP lost, its candidates received a commendable vote share of more than 40 per cent. 

The other opposition parties, however, encountered resounding rejection. In the majority of constituencies they contested, PAP won by a landslide.

Public issues discussed in the online sphere

A good part of the conversations was around everyday issues that mattered to Singaporeans. To quickly make sense of the thousands of comments we gathered, we used our proprietary generative AI model to sort them into key themes.


 

One thing we noticed was that people often mentioned multiple issues in their comments, reflecting the interconnected nature of their real-life experiences. Given this, we allowed each comment to be grouped under more than one theme.

You can explore these themes for yourself. Click on any of the boxes below for a glimpse into the diverse viewpoints that shaped the online conversations.

Quick note before you scroll on: we are aware there were bots during the election and therefore not all responses were genuine. It is something that warrants a separate study. Secondly, these comments are from the public and do not represent the views of our newsroom. We simply want to help you make better sense of the overall conversation.

 
 

Sample comments

Click on the boxes on the left to view any sample comments Click on the boxes above to view any sample comments
 

Battleground constituencies

Switching gears, let’s take a closer look at the constituencies that had the most heated contests.

For this, we charted the daily volume of comments attributed to the major parties — PAP, WP, Progress Singapore Party and Singapore Democratic Party — and their respective candidates and measured the sentiments of these comments towards them. To do this, we used a sentiment model to tag each mention of a party or candidate with a sentiment label (Positive, Negative, Neutral or Mixed).

Click on the candidates’ photos below to see how online opinion on the themes and issues ebbed and flowed in three key battlegrounds – Tampines GRC, Jalan Kayu SMC and Punggol GRC.

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People’s Action Party
 
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Overall support for political parties

Finally, the big question: did the online chatter accurately predict the election results?

 

Overall support for political parties

Finally, the big question: did the online chatter accurately predict the election results?

 
Our simple answer: not quite. While the online conversation showed plenty of support for both the incumbent and the opposition, it didn't fully capture the scale of PAP’s landslide victory. This could be due to the ‘spiral of silence’ — many voters might have stayed silent, perhaps for fear of being ridiculed or public backlash, including in digital spaces such as social media. However, we did discover something else – at the constituency level, places with notably more specific and negative online chatter were also where the vote margin was tightest. It seems when people had strong, targeted opinions online, a real competition was brewing on the ground.
Our simple answer: not quite. While the online conversation showed plenty of support for both the incumbent and the opposition, it didn't fully capture the scale of PAP’s landslide victory. This could be due to the ‘spiral of silence’ — many voters might have stayed silent, perhaps for fear of being ridiculed or public backlash, including in digital spaces such as social media. However, we did discover something else – at the constituency level, places with notably more specific and negative online chatter were also where the vote margin was tightest. It seems when people had strong, targeted opinions online, a real competition was brewing on the ground.
 

At AsiaOne, communications is both an art and a science. We conduct polls and social listening using award-winning AI models 24/7 to understand our users' perception and opinions towards social issues, as well as their consumer preferences.

Want more insights on the public’s attitudes and perceptions towards social issues? Get in touch! Contact us at insights@asiaone.com to explore opportunities to undertake meaningful research.

PRODUCED BY: 
Chloe Lim, Kelly Tan, Grace Ow, Kaitlyn Tan, Diana Ow, Edmund Chua, Desmond Chua, Esther Lai, Sam Ong, Liu Ying, Lucy Shuai, Kimberly Pontanares, Federick Phng, Jasper Lim, Tan Thiam Peng

PHOTOS BY: 
Chia Long Jun, Ho Jia Fen, Rauf Khan, Lau Han An, Dennis Palit, Darren Wong, Xie Feng Mao