Six candidates stood for the leadership: Kemi Badenoch, James Cleverly, Robert Jenrick, Priti Patel, Mel Stride and Tom Tugendhat.

Following a strong performance at the Conservative Party Conference, Cleverly emerged as a frontrunner by coming first in the third round of voting, whilst Tugendhat was eliminated.

[3] A leadership election was triggered to replace him, in which Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss were the final two candidates to be put forward to party members after a series of MPs' ballots.

Truss' tenure oversaw the death and state funeral of Queen Elizabeth II, which caused government business to be suspended during the 10-day national mourning period from 8–19 September.

On 23 September 2022, in response to the cost-of-living crisis, Truss' Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng announced a 'mini-budget', which introduced large-scale tax cuts and borrowing.

Later that evening, a parliamentary vote on a debate to ban fracking — which was opposed by the government — descended into chaos over confusion whether it was being treated as a confidence vote in the government, compounded by speculation that the chief whip and deputy chief whip had resigned, and by allegations, later refuted, that some Conservative MPs had been manhandled in the division lobby.

On 20 October, the following day, Truss announced she would resign as Prime Minister and Conservative leader shortly, triggering a second leadership election to find her replacement.

There was intensive speculation that Johnson would initiate a bid for a return to the top post; at one point he was expected to stand and even received 62 nominations from MPs, but he subsequently declined to enter the race.

Sunak was faced with the task of rebuilding the Conservatives' reputation which had been significantly damaged by the controversies and scandals of the previous year and the Truss ministry.

[20] In early July, shortly after the general election, reports suggested that Danny Kruger and John Hayes, prominent MPs on the right of the party, were going to support the prospective leadership candidate Robert Jenrick.

This was seen as an early setback for Suella Braverman, since both Kruger and Hayes previously campaigned for her bid to succeed Boris Johnson in July 2022.

[21][22][23] The i reported that following Braverman's controversial speeches regarding the pride flag, multiple Conservative MPs believed she had lost her support among her colleagues and could defect to Reform UK.

[26] James Cleverly, Tom Tugendhat, Robert Jenrick, Mel Stride, Priti Patel and Kemi Badenoch were the confirmed candidates at the deadline of nominations on 29 July.

[27] Tugendhat and Cleverly were pitching themselves as more moderate, centre-ground candidates, while Badenoch, Jenrick and Patel were competing for the vote of the party's right-wing, and Stride is seen as being between the two groupings.

Winner Eliminated:2 November 2024 The following Conservative Party politicians explored a run but ultimately declined to stand or failed to receive the ten required nominations: The following figures lost their seats in the 2024 general election and are ineligible, but were discussed as potential candidates prior to electoral results.

The following were suggested by commentators as potential candidates for the leadership but declined to stand: Electoral Calculus conducted a multilevel regression with poststratification (MRP) opinion poll from 11 to 15 October 2024 on behalf of Jack Lewy of the Robert Jenrick campaign, asking the general public how they would vote if respectively Kemi Badenoch or Robert Jenrick were elected leader of the Conservatives.