[5] With 28% of votes, the opposition Christian Democratic Union (CDU) grew by over ten percentage points and emerged as the largest party by a wide margin, the first time it had done so since the 1999 Berlin state election.

All three governing parties declined; the SPD suffered its worst result in over a century with 18.4%, and only barely remained ahead of the Greens by a margin of 53 votes.

The Alternative for Germany (AfD) recorded a small upswing to 9%, while the Free Democratic Party (FDP) fell to 4.6% and lost all their seats.

[9][10] State electoral officer Stephan Bröchler confirmed that the election would take place on Sunday 12 February, the latest possible date.

[11] The sitting members of the House of Representatives who, in accordance with the ruling of the Constitutional Court, remained in office until the repeat election, could have circumvented the court ruling by dissolving the house and thus bringing about a snap election for a regular 20th legislative period (this is possible under the Berlin state constitution with a two-thirds majority of all members of parliament).

However, parties which win at least one single-member constituency are exempt from the threshold and will be allocated seats proportionally, even if they fall below 5%.

The Alternative for Germany (AfD) lost almost half their voteshare and fell to 8.0%, while the Free Democratic Party (FDP) saw a small improvement to 7.1%.

The atmosphere at the former was described as cool and the latter was friendly and cordial; the SPD were noted as being significantly closer to the CDU on policy compared to the Greens.

[13][14] With all parties except The Left remaining publicly noncommital, speculation began to grow of a CDU-led government rather than a rapid renewal of the outgoing coalition as many expected.

[19] The final results of the election were published on 27 February, clarifying that the SPD had finished ahead of the Greens, albeit by an even narrower margin of 53 votes.

She described the outgoing coalition as "crisis-ridden" for which she blamed the Greens, pointing to conflict over the SPD's 29-euro ticket policy and housing construction, and accused them of a lack of respect for her leadership.

The Greens and Left expressed outrage at the SPD's decision; both stated that they were not informed before the public announcement and that another round of talks had already been agreed on.

Bettina Jarasch accused them of "slamming the door" and Silke Gebel described their actions as a breach of trust.

Katina Schubert called it "incomprehensible", while Klaus Lederer said that responsibility lay solely with the SPD, saying "there is nothing insurmountable [between the parties]".

The SPD's youth branch Jusos also spoke out in strong opposition to a coalition with the CDU, with chairman Peter Maaß describing the party as a real estate lobby.

They planned to conclude a coalition pact within three weeks to give the SPD time for its membership vote, and install the new government at the start of May.

The agreement also featured a number of flagship SPD policies on housing as well as the 29-euro ticket, and preserved the anti-discrimination law and automatic minimum wage increases, both of which the CDU had sought to repeal.

The AfD claimed to have voted for him on the third ballot, criticising what they called the coalition's "obvious inability" to create majorities and insisting they were taking on responsibility.