Israelis Spent a Record NIS 1.75 Billion by Card on Election Day, Up 30% From the 2022 Vote

Israelis spent NIS 1.752 billion using payment cards on Tuesday, Oct. 27, the national day off for the election to the 26th Knesset, according to data from Shva, the company that operates Israel’s national card-payment system. That is 30.2% more than the NIS 1.346 billion spent on the previous Knesset election day, Nov. 1, 2022, and about 10% more than the NIS 1.591 billion recorded on the 2024 municipal election day, which had been the record, Ynet and Israel Hayom reported.

Kikar HaShabbat highlighted the figures in a Hebrew-language Instagram post. “They went out to vote, and didn’t stop spending: Israelis swiped NIS 1.75 billion on election day,” the post said, adding that “while the politicians counted votes, the Israelis counted purchases.”

Where the money went

Between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m., the peak hours, card spending totaled NIS 1.149 billion, compared with NIS 808.51 million in the same hours in 2022, according to Shva figures reported by Israel Hayom. Compared with 2022, the sharpest increase came in leisure, entertainment and attractions, up about 72.3%, followed by restaurants, cafes and fast food, up about 53.9% to NIS 181.4 million. Delicatessens, grocery shops and kiosks rose about 49% and pharmacies about 33.5%. Supermarket chains again took the largest share, at about NIS 238.2 million, up 24.2% from about NIS 191.9 million in 2022. Ynet noted that supermarket prices have also risen sharply since 2024.

Other companies reported a similar pattern. Isracard’s data chief, Adar Goren, told Ynet that in-store transactions rose 58% while online sales fell 44% in value. Fintech company Hyp reported a 148% jump in fashion transactions compared with the previous Tuesday, as retailers offered discounts of 15% to 50%, while food-delivery orders fell 15.3%. Ofer Malls chief executive Omer Ogolnik told Ynet that its malls saw three times the visitors of a regular day, and Dizengoff Center in Tel Aviv reported about 22,000 visitors by 1 p.m., 2.5 times a normal day.

The spending was not uniform across the country. According to Isracard’s analysis, purchases tripled in the Sharon region and rose 2.5-fold in Hadera and the Krayot area near Haifa, while Tel Aviv rose a more modest 60% and Eilat declined 7%, Ynet reported.

Election day is a paid day off for most workers in Israel, intended to make it easier to vote, and recent election days have regularly produced spikes in retail and leisure spending.

Source: Instagram, @kikarhashabat. This report is an English translation of a Hebrew-language post.

View the original post on Instagram

Sources: Kikar HaShabbat on Instagram (Hebrew, translated), Oct. 28, 2026; Ynet News, “Vote and shop: Israelis smash Election Day spending records,” by Meirav Crystal; Israel Hayom (Hebrew, translated), Shva election-day spending report, Oct. 28, 2026.