The incumbent President Claudio Burlando of the centre-left Democratic Party (PD) faced Sandro Biasotti, backed by The People of Freedom (PdL) and Northern League Liguria.

The Union of the Centre (UdC), a traditionally centre-right political force, supported the centre-left candidate Burlando.

Burlando secured a second consecutive term, but the PdL came out as the largest party in the region.

Regional elections in Liguria were ruled by the "Tatarella law" (approved in 1995), which provided for a mixed electoral system: four fifths of the regional councilors were elected in provincial constituencies by proportional representation, using the largest remainder method with a droop quota and open lists, while the residual votes and the unassigned seats were grouped into a "single regional constituency", where the whole ratios and the highest remainders were divided with the Hare method among the provincial party lists; one fifth of the council seats instead was reserved for regional lists and assigned with a majoritarian system: the leader of the regional list that scored the highest number of votes was elected to the presidency of the Region while the other candidates were elected regional councilors.

A threshold of 3% had been established for the provincial lists, which, however, could still have entered the regional council if the regional list to which they were connected had scored at least 5% of valid votes.