The earliest example we found is from 1918: paper “I voted. Did you?” tags for voters around Grand Rapids, Michigan. This history follows those tags to the flag oval of 1987 and the local designs voters wear today.
There’s no settled origin story. Paper “I have voted” tags go back at least to 1918, and the sticker most people picture took shape in the 1980s.
The earliest examples we found
In October 1918, a Michigan paper announced plans to hand voters paper tags reading “I am an American. I voted. Did you?”, and a 1922 book describes Grand Rapids voters getting them at the polls in 1919. Later histories cite a 1950 Miami Herald item about “I Have Voted” stickers at the polls, but we haven’t read that page. The earliest adhesive “I voted” sticker we found is a 1950 party sticker for car windows.
An early organized sticker campaign
In 1985, the Phoenix Board of Realtors handed out “I Voted Today” stickers during a freeway bond election, hoping to lift slow afternoon turnout.
The familiar flag oval design
In 1987, Janet Boudreau designed a small oval with a waving flag for Intab, the election supply company she had recently bought from her father for $1.
What We Haven’t Verified
We haven’t read the 1950 Miami Herald page itself, which is in a subscription newspaper archive, so we can’t say what the stickers looked like or whether they were handed out. The tags in sources from 1918 to the 1960s were paper, and we haven’t found who first printed an adhesive “I Voted” sticker. Phoenix’s Realtors later called their sticker the first in the country, but a 1982 Miami Herald story had already described shops giving discounts to people wearing voting stickers. No patent for Boudreau’s flag oval has turned up; she has said she copyrighted the design.
How a local giveaway became an Election Day tradition. Tap a date to open its story. Gaps mean we haven't found a documented example, not that nothing happened.
Before stickersStickerDigitalEvidence incompleteBold: turning points. Dots sit roughly by year within each era.
Origins 1918–1966
1918
Michigan Paper Announces Plans to Tag Every Voter
The Lowell Ledger, a weekly near Grand Rapids, Michigan, reports that a local Americanization society has started “a movement to tag every voter” and will hand out tags reading “I am an American. I voted. Did you?” at the November election. It’s the earliest example we found.
In Grand Rapids, Michigan, committees of women hand voters paper tags at the polls reading “I am an American. I voted. Did you?” Only voters can get one. After each election, schoolchildren collect the tags, and the schools that bring back the most win flags. The campaign was part of the city’s Americanization work, which pushed immigrants to become citizens and vote.
For a student election at Ben Blewett Junior High School in St. Louis, the school’s printing department makes “I have voted” tags, one for each student as they vote. The school, open since 1917, already ran its own student government: each homeroom elected two delegates to a grade congress, its first principal wrote in 1919. A few years later, Tennessee Williams was a student there: his 1925 Blewett yearbook has one of his early poems.
A ribbon badge in the Smithsonian marks a woman's first vote under the 19th Amendment. It supports the Harding and Coolidge ticket, a reminder that voting souvenirs weren't always nonpartisan.
An October 27, 1950 Miami Herald story about a vote on a $6 million hospital expansion bond said “I Have Voted” stickers would be handed out at the polls “as a reminder to others to cast their vote,” according to Mental Floss. It’s the earliest mention of a sticker we’ve seen cited. The Herald page is in a subscription archive, and we haven’t read it ourselves.
A gummed sticker reading “Thank Me I Voted Republican,” printed with “Moisten and stick to car window,” is dated 1950 in St. Lawrence University’s Richard F. Brush Art Gallery collection. It was a party sticker for a car, not a polling-place giveaway, and it’s the earliest adhesive “I voted” sticker we found.
Texas Voters Wear “I Have Voted, Have You?” Badges
On Election Day in Sherman, Texas, “citizens who had voted put on badges: ‘I have voted, have you?’” an Associated Press report in The Austin Statesman says. It’s the earliest example we found of the “have you?” line that later stickers made familiar.
In Lowell, Michigan, the local paper reports that Boy Scouts will hand out “I Voted” badges at the polling place on Election Day. Grade-school pupils will collect the “I Have Voted” tags at least a block away, and the classroom that gathers the most will win an award.
Black Residents Pin Tags on Voters in Americus, Georgia
At an Americus, Georgia city primary, Black residents pin “I have voted” tags on voters as they leave, while every clerk and manager is white, a 1968 U.S. Commission on Civil Rights report says.
Phoenix Realtors Hand Out “I Voted Today” Stickers
During a freeway bond election, the Phoenix Board of Realtors hands out “I Voted Today” stickers, one of the earliest organized sticker campaigns documented so far.
Janet Boudreau designs a white oval with a waving flag for Intab. It becomes one of the country's most recognizable voting sticker designs. She has said she drew it after seeing a Washington state county hand out a plain black-and-white sticker with an X in a square.
Minnesota’s election law lets the secretary of state send counties donated stickers that say “I VOTED” and nothing more. Election judges may offer one to each voter who has signed the polling place roster.
After a reminder about election law, Starbucks and Ben & Jerry's open their Election Day offers to everyone, not just customers wearing “I Voted” stickers.
Michigan's second statewide contest draws 2,095 entries. The state screens qualifying designs for AI-generated and copied artwork before the public vote.
The People Who Designed and Spread Voting Stickers
Most voting stickers carry no designer credit. These are some of the people behind them.
Intab · 1987
Janet Boudreau
Designing the Familiar Flag Oval
Soon after buying Intab from her father for $1, Boudreau designed the flag oval. By 2000, she said, the company sold more than 100 million “I Voted” stickers in each election year. Her practical advice: use garment-safe adhesive, or risk damaging leather, silk and fine wool.
See the evidence
Boudreau created her “I Voted” design in 1987, soon after becoming president and owner of Intab, an election supply business she purchased from her father for a single dollar.
Morning turnout was strong; afternoons lagged. During a freeway bond election, Phoenix Board of Realtors president Skip Rimsza, later the city's mayor, and operations director Dennis M. Burke came up with an “I Voted Today” sticker to remind late-day voters.
See the evidence
Rimsza and Dennis M. Burke, the board's operations director then, brainstormed the sticker to spark voter interest. Morning voter turnout at most elections was strong, but the afternoon was always the weakest.
Negasi's design marked the 100th anniversary of women's suffrage. When several polling places ran out during the August 2020 election, Metro Arts posted a free download.
See the evidence
During the August 6 election, several polling locations ran out of the popular sticker, designed by Hume-Fogg Academic Magnet High School senior Milka Negasi to commemorate the Women's Suffrage Centennial.
Rowan designed the wild-eyed head on spidery legs for one county's election, not all of New York. Election commissioner Ashley Dittus opened his emailed entry first and championed it; an online vote open to anyone turned it into a national curiosity.
See the evidence
Hudson’s unconventional design has won international acclaim and amassed over 228,200 votes worldwide.
Hynous's design shows a werewolf tearing open its shirt in front of an American flag. It was one of nine winners in Michigan's first statewide contest, and a sheet of the 2024 designs is now in the collection at The Henry Ford.
See the evidence
Elementary / Middle School Winner - Created by Jane Hynous of Grosse Pointe, a student at Brownell Middle School
Lavallee created four designs featuring Alaskan women. They came in English, Spanish, Tagalog and seven Alaska Native languages, including Koyukon, Gwich'in and Yup'ik, and people voting from home could download them.
See the evidence
The stickerswereavailable in English, Spanish, Koyukon, Gwichin, Aleut, Tagalog, Alutiiq, Northern Inupiaq, Nunivak Cupig, and Yup'ik. For those who votedfrom home, digital stickerswereavailable for download on the Divisions website so voters could display that they exercised their right to vote.
Boren's hand-drawn entry featured a mailbox, so the county turned it into an “I Voted at Home” sticker that goes out with absentee ballots.
See the evidence
As a bonus, the BOE also got a new "I Voted at Home" sticker when the artwork from eleven-year-old Julia Boren included a mailbox in the design in her hand drawn entry. The design is now included with absentee ballots mailed to St. Louis County voters.
Through most of the 1800s, many Americans voted with ballots printed by the political parties. The tickets were often easy to tell apart, sometimes by color, and voters handed them in where others could see. States began adopting a government-printed secret ballot in 1888, starting with Louisville and Massachusetts. As it replaced party tickets, voters could keep their choices to themselves. An “I Voted” sticker shows that a person voted without revealing how. A 1919 Grand Rapids campaign put it plainly: “Whether or not you vote is not your business; it is Uncle Sam’s business. HOW you vote is your business.”
Researchers have tested what happens when voting becomes visible to neighbors and friends. None of the studies below tested paper “I Voted” stickers.
A Michigan Mailer Study
In a 2006 Michigan primary, researchers mailed some households a list showing whether they and their neighbors had voted. Turnout in those households was 8.1 percentage points higher than in homes that got no mailer.
Facebook, Election Day 2010
On Election Day 2010, Facebook showed 61 million users a message with an “I Voted” button. Some also saw photos of friends who had already clicked it. Researchers estimated a small rise in turnout, most of it passed along through close friends rather than from the message itself. A repeat test in the 2012 presidential election found a similar small rise.
A Digital Sticker Test, 2018
In 2018, Vote.org sent texts reminding people to vote and checked who voted afterward. Some texts also linked to a digital “I Voted” sticker to post on Facebook. Both kinds of text raised turnout by about a quarter of a percentage point (0.25 with the sticker link, 0.24 without), so the sticker added no measurable effect. The results come from the group’s own research memo, not a peer-reviewed journal.
Facebook’s Estimated Turnout Effect: Direct vs. Through FriendsEstimated additional voters from Facebook's 2010 Election Day message
Direct effect18%~60,000
Through friends82%~280,000
Facebook’s Estimated Turnout Effect: Direct vs. Through Friends
Direct effect
about 60,000
Through friends
about 280,000
Researchers estimated about 340,000 additional voters overall, most of them through friends. These are estimates, not votes Facebook counted: the study randomly assigned message versions and compared a sample of users with public voting records.
The mailer and Facebook studies tested voting made visible to neighbors or friends, and the one test of a digital sticker link found no extra effect. A paper sticker may work the same way, but these studies don’t show it.
In 2019, the U.S. Election Assistance Commission created a Clearie Award category for original and creative “I Voted” stickers. Washoe County, Nevada was among the first winners, for a design with the Sierra behind the city skyline.
In 2017, New Yorkers ranked the finalist designs. The winning sticker, by Marie Dagata and Scott Heinz, ran colored subway lines through the “O” in “I Voted.”
Michigan's first statewide contest drew more than 480 designs and more than 57,700 public votes in 2024. In 2026 it drew 2,095 entries, and the state screened every qualifying design for AI-generated and copied artwork before the public vote.
Denver held a design contest through its program for confined voters. Two winning designs went out in the city's November 2024 mail-ballot packets.
Ulster County Contest: Online Votes vs. County PopulationHudson Rowan's design received more than 228,200 online votes, more than Ulster County's roughly 182,000 residents.
Ulster County residents (2022 estimate)182,357
Votes for Hudson Rowan's design228,200+
Ulster County Contest: Online Votes vs. County Population
Ulster County residents (2022 estimate)
182,357
Votes for Hudson Rowan's design
more than 228,200
The online vote was open to anyone, anywhere, so a county contest drew more votes than the county has residents.
Michigan Sticker Contest Entries, 2024 and 2026Designs entered in Michigan's statewide sticker contest
2024480+
20262,095
Michigan Sticker Contest Entries, 2024 and 2026
2024
more than 480
2026
2,095
Entries grew about fourfold in two years. 2024 is a minimum ("more than 480"); 2026 is the published total. The first contest also drew more than 57,700 public votes.
There's no national sticker program. State and local election offices decide whether to order them, and how many. In 2020, Kings County, California paid $2,858.41 for 60,000 stickers: one for every registered voter, or about 4.8 cents each. San Francisco's last order that year cost about 7 cents a sticker; generic designs bought in bulk can cost as little as a penny.
How Mail Voters Get “I Voted” Stickers
Some offices make sure mail voters get one too. After noticing voters dropping off mail ballots in person just to collect a sticker, San Mateo County started putting one in every mailed ballot package in 2019. Pima County, Arizona sends a trilingual sticker in English, Tohono O'odham and Spanish. In 2012, Santa Clara County made the opposite choice and saved more than $90,000 by leaving stickers out of mail packets.
Other offices offer digital versions. Alaska posted its 2020 designs for download, Oregon offers virtual stickers, and the Federal Voting Assistance Program offers “I Voted From” stickers for Americans voting overseas.
Sticker Shortages and Cleanup
Popular designs can cause a supply problem. Ulster County had 100,000 of Hudson Rowan's stickers for about 90,000 expected voters in 2022 and told poll workers to give out one per person. That year the Election Assistance Commission also advised offices to order stickers at least four months ahead, because paper supplies were tight.
Stickers can create cleanup costs too. Chicago stopped using them for about a decade after voters stuck them on water fountains, windows and doors, leaving custodians to spend hours scraping them off. The city handed out one million wristbands in 2016, about 1.9 cents each, then returned to stickers in 2021 and 2022, partly because they fit inside mail-ballot envelopes.
In 2008, Starbucks and Ben & Jerry's planned Election Day giveaways for customers wearing an “I Voted” sticker. After a reminder that election law bars rewarding people for voting, both opened the offers to everyone. Federal law makes it a crime to pay or offer something of value to get someone to vote.
State rules can be stricter. Wisconsin election officials have said a sticker-only discount violates state law there; giveaways must be open to everyone, whether they voted or not. Check current federal and state guidance before offering an Election Day promotion. This is general information, not legal advice.
Illinois protects access to the sticker: if an election authority supplies them to polling places, no voter there may be denied one.
Why Voters Leave Stickers at Susan B. Anthony's Grave
Since at least 2014, voters have left “I Voted” stickers at Susan B. Anthony's grave in Rochester's Mount Hope Cemetery, to honor her work winning women the right to vote. As many as 12,000 people visited on Election Day 2016, the first time voters could choose a woman as a major-party presidential nominee.
The adhesive, and the solvents used to remove it, damaged the marble. Since 2020, the cemetery's friends group has covered the headstone with a clear protective sleeve during election season, so visitors can leave stickers without harming the stone. A religious-studies scholar has described the practice as a kind of votive offering.
Some Vote Sticker state pages include a local sticker story, from a student contest winner to a sticker written into state law. Choose a highlighted state to read one.
Explore featured sticker stories by stateSelect a highlighted state to preview its story.
Alaska Kids' art on the stickers, with a youth contest that picked one winner from each of five regions.
Alabama For the November 3, 2026 general election, Alabama's Secretary of State released newly designed America 250 I Voted stickers, marking the country's 250th anniversary.
Arizona Maricopa County held its first I Voted sticker contests in 2024 and used four winning designs that year.
California Santa Clara County's first I Voted sticker contest drew 203 student designs, and more than 10,000 public votes picked six winners.
Colorado High school students compete to design the state's digital I Voted sticker.
Connecticut State law lets poll workers hand out stickers inside the no-campaigning zone.
Florida counties In Sarasota County, a seventh grader's pink flamingo won a student contest.
Georgia Five million new stickers by artist Steve Penley, sent to all 159 counties.
Hawaii A virtual sticker unlocked once your ballot was accepted for counting.
Iowa For the November 3, 2026 election, Johnson County gave people who voted early after 5 p.m.
Idaho The state's own voting guide ends with: grab a sticker and wear it proudly.
Illinois In Lake County, students designed the 2026 sticker.
Indiana In 2024 the Indiana Secretary of State held an I Voted sticker contest for students in kindergarten through 12th grade.
Kansas The state's what-to-expect list ends with a reminder not to forget your sticker.
Kentucky A third annual statewide contest for students from kindergarten through 12th grade.
Louisiana An artist-painted sticker every election since George Rodrigue's Blue Dog in 2016.
Massachusetts In Middleborough, four young artists, Nolan, Abby, Calleigh and Colette, won the Town Clerk's 2026 I Voted sticker contest.
Maryland Downloadable stickers with an oriole, a crab and the Bay Bridge, some in Spanish.
Maine For its 2020 student mock election, the Maine Secretary of State gave schools two printable "I Voted Today" sticker designs, made for Avery 5160 mailing labels.
Michigan A statewide contest that drew more than 2,000 designs and picked nine winners.
Minnesota The sticker is written into state law. It says "I VOTED" and nothing more.
North Dakota "You Betcha I Voted" won the first statewide contest, picked by 4,792 voters.
Nebraska Lancaster County picked new “I Voted” and “Future Voter” stickers in its first sticker contest.
New Hampshire New Hampshire's 2026 I Voted stickers were drawn by six fourth- and fifth-grade students from Milford, Windham, Lebanon, Chester, Etna and Nottingham.
Nevada For Election Day 2024, Allegiant Stadium was an official Clark County polling place, and voters who cast a ballot there got an "I VOTED" sticker made by the Las Vegas Raiders.
Ulster County, New York Home of Hudson Rowan's sticker; the student contest is in its sixth year.
Ohio A 2019 student contest drew over 2,000 entries and 15,000 votes.
Oklahoma Ask for your sticker before you leave, and wear it to encourage others.
Oregon Everyone votes by mail, so the stickers are virtual: "I Voted (The Oregon Way)."
Pennsylvania Allegheny County's first I Voted sticker contest drew more than 13,000 public votes.
Rhode Island The state's voter handbook tells you to wear your sticker after you vote.
South Carolina South Carolina's State Election Commission introduced two new statewide "I Voted" sticker designs for the 2022 elections, and they won a national Clearie Award from the U.S.
South Dakota Students from kindergarten to 12th grade designed the next sticker.
Tennessee A special America 250 edition for the country's 250th anniversary.
Texas In El Paso County, voters get student-designed stickers during the 2026 elections.
Utah In 2020 the state posted four stickers to download and print at home.
Vermont Each year the Secretary of State's office supports a contest, part of the Good Citizen Challenge hosted by Seven Days, where K-8 students design an alternative "I Voted" sticker.
Washington Snohomish County has seven new I Voted designs for the November 3 election, showing the county's landscapes, industries and cultures.
Wisconsin Washington County’s clerk asked students in kindergarten through 12th grade to design the 2026 “I Voted” sticker.
West Virginia An eighth grader's design went to 11,000 voters in one county's primary.
Wyoming A 2019 contest marked 150 years of women's suffrage in the state.
Share an “I Voted” Sticker Online
Polling places still hand out paper stickers, and social apps put them online years ago.
Facebook’s Election Day button ran in 2008, when more than 5.4 million people used it to say they voted, and by 2014 it came in Spanish, Chinese and Korean. In 2018 Instagram added an “I Voted” sticker for Stories, with a “Yo Voté” version.
Physical
1 At the polls
A sticker tells the people around you that you voted: at work, in line for coffee, at school pickup.
Local
2 From your community
A local artist, student or election office can make a sticker feel like it belongs where you live.
Digital
3 On your profile
A digital sticker reaches friends you may not see that day. Use it before you vote to share a date, or afterward to say you did.
Make a free sticker for your state and share it as your profile picture. Before you vote, add your early voting or Election Day date in the “Dates or extra text” box; afterward, pick an “I voted” design. Planning a photo at the polling place? Ballot selfie rules vary by state, so check yours first.
“I Voted” sticker history is full of claims repeated so often that their original source gets lost. This page starts with museum records, election office materials, laws, original research and reporting from the time. When the best evidence is a later retelling, the page says so. When we haven't read the original source ourselves, we say so.
