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Polls close at 7pm except in larger cities, but counting of votes start at this time. It's forbidden to leak the results until 8pm, at which time the sample is large enough to give a precise estimate, unlikely to move by much.

If polls haven't closed yet, shouldn't exit polls be made illegal? Because exit polls can manipulate opinions.

That is already illegal in France. Exit polls can be taken, but cannot be published until after polling booths close.

Since the polling booths are now closed (it is 8:30pm in France), these exit polls have been published. That is what the Beeb article is based on.

> at which time the sample is large enough to give a precise estimate, unlikely to move by much.

More importantly, at which time all booths are closed.

Estimate of voting booth all around. Probably gonna shift a bit until midnight but not by much and surely not enough to modify the results; and so far it seems Macron is going from 65.1 to 65.5.

Is not confirmed