Germany could face months of political uncertainty after snap elections on February 23 as the winning party will almost certainly have to form a coalition to secure a majority.
The frontrunner in the race to run Germany is Friedrich Merz, whose Christian Democrats (CDU) are up to 10 points ahead in the polls. But he will need a partner, possibly two.
A so-called grand coalition of the two big centrist parties, the CDU/CSU and Chancellor Olaf Scholz's center-left Social Democrats (SPD), is seen as the most likely election outcome.
Although no other party is prepared to let the AfD into government, if they come second and attract 20% of the vote, they could double their number of seats in the Bundestag.
