Which country was the first to grant women national voting rights, in 1893?

New Zealand was the first self-governing country to grant women the right to vote in national elections, doing so in 1893. The Electoral Act became law on 19 September 1893, and women voted in the general election held later that year.

The achievement followed decades of campaigning led by suffragists including Kate Sheppard. Activists organised petitions, public meetings, pamphlets, and temperance campaigns, arguing that women should have the same political voice as men.

The law gave women the right to vote, but it did not immediately give them the right to stand for Parliament. New Zealand women gained the right to be elected to the House of Representatives in 1919.

The distinction between voting and holding office matters when comparing countries. Some places allowed women to vote in particular local or colonial elections earlier, while national suffrage arrived at different times. New Zealand’s 1893 reform is therefore usually described precisely as the first national voting right for women in a self-governing country.