The Road to the Brownlow Medal: What You Need to Know
Updated: Sep 16
How Many Votes Does It Take to Win the Brownlow Medal?
There’s no fixed number, but there’s a clear range — and it’s shifting. For most of the past two decades, a winning tally sat somewhere in the high 20s to mid-30s. For instance, Matt Priddis won with 26 votes in 2014. Patrick Cripps took home the medal with 29 votes in 2022, and Lachie Neale won with 31 votes in 2023.
Then it changed. Cripps polled an astonishing 45 votes in 2024 — a record by nine votes. Rowell followed with 39 votes in 2025. In fact, two of the three highest tallies in the history of the 3-2-1 system have come in the past two seasons. For 2026, we at Downlow on the Brownlow assume that a winning score will land in the mid-to-high 30s. Anything under 30 would now be an outlier rather than the norm.
The Winning Tally, Year by Year
Year | Winner | Votes |
2025 | Matt Rowell | 39 |
2024 | Patrick Cripps | 45 |
2023 | Lachie Neale | 31 |
2022 | Patrick Cripps | 29 |
2021 | Ollie Wines | 36 |
2020 | Lachie Neale | 31 |
2019 | Nat Fyfe | 33 |
Why the Number Keeps Climbing
Three things are happening at once:
Votes are concentrating in fewer players. In 2024, the entire top ten was made up of midfielders. They took roughly a quarter of every vote awarded across the season. When the same profile of player takes votes week after week, the leader's tally grows.
The gap between the top and the bottom has become extreme. Cripps's 45 votes in 2024 was more than the combined total of every player at North Melbourne, West Coast, or Richmond that year. West Coast's entire list polled just 12 votes across the 2025 season — the lowest club tally ever recorded under the 3-2-1 system.
The umpires are rewarding a narrower type of game. High-possession, high-clearance inside midfielders poll relentlessly. Rowell ranked second in the AFL for clearances and third for both tackles and contested possessions in 2025, polling in 16 separate games.
The practical effect for anyone projecting the count: the ceiling has moved. Models built on the assumption that 32 votes win a Brownlow have been undershooting.
What It Takes to Win in 2026
Three things travel together in almost every recent winner:
Eight or more best-on-ground performances. Rowell had eight in 2025, while Cripps had twelve in 2024.
Polling in more than half the season's games. Rowell polled in 16 games.
A team winning enough games to matter. Umpires vote off winning sides far more often than losing ones. This is why a career-best year at a bottom-four club rarely converts to a Brownlow win.
A player can be the best in the competition and still not win. That’s what makes the count worth projecting rather than assuming.
How Downlow on the Brownlow Projects the Count
At Downlow on the Brownlow, we don’t run a single model. Each season, we combine the vote counts of 20 independent expert analysts. Each analyst counts every home-and-away match 3-2-1 on their own. We blend those counts into one consensus projection covering every player and every game.
The full 2026 projection — player by player, match by match, with projected vote totals for every contender — is available in the Spreadsheet and the Package.
The 2026 Brownlow Medal count is on Monday 21 September at Crown Palladium, Melbourne.
Think you can pick the top four? Entry to the Downlow on the Brownlow tipping competition is free, and there’s a $1,000 prize pack up for grabs.
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