Donald Trump has been elected president of the United States after flipping multiple swing states to secure the 270 electoral college votes needed to win.
Election day was a relatively smooth affair for voters, despite bomb threats, false claims of a fake Melania at a Florida voting centre and the spreading of misinformation on social media.
Not long after the last poll closed, it became clear Trump was leading in all of the widely watched swing states and had a clear path to victory.
He will become the second person in American history to serve non-consecutive terms as president, after Grover Cleveland in the late 19th Century.
In a victory speech to supporters in Florida, Trump claimed that America will be "bigger, better, bolder" in his second term in the White House and promised to "fight for you, for your family, and your future".
"We have been through so much together and today you showed up and in record numbers to deliver a victory like probably no other, this is something special," he said.
"We are going to pay you back, we are going to do the best job, we are going to turn it around and it will be turned around fast."
[Overall No Map]From a clear result in an election many pundits thought would be too close to call, to Republicans retaking the Senate and a grim mood at Harris headquarters, these were the key moments from election day.
Donald Trump claims victory after sweeping battleground states
In an address to supporters gathered at an election watch party in West Palm Beach on Wednesday morning (local time), Trump claimed he had won the popular vote.
It prompted loud chants of "USA, USA, USA" from those inside the room.
The former president said the election result was "a political victory that our country has never seen before".
"I want to thank the American people for the extraordinary honour of being elected your 47th president and your 45th president," he said.
He went on to thank his wife Melania, his children and his vice president JD Vance for their efforts during the campaign, noting that he had taken a little heat at the beginning for his choice of running mate.
"We're going to have a great four years and turn our country around and make it something very special," he said.
Hours before his address, two battleground states offered early signs of who would ultimately claim victory in the race: Georgia and North Carolina.
Both states are famous for relatively quick counts, and both were soon called for Trump.
[North Carolina][Georgia]It left Kamala Harris's victory dependent on sweeping Wisconsin, Michigan and the real prize, Pennsylvania.
The states are regarded as the "blue wall", and once were reliable Democratic strongholds, but they've been known to crumble in favour of Republicans now and then.
That turned out to be the case for Trump, who claimed Pennsylvania just as he strolled on to the Florida stage to the roar of supporters.
[Pennsylvania]The state of Wisconsin ultimately pushed him beyond the 270 electoral college votes needed to win.
Kamala Harris’s night went from underwhelming to funeral
Democratic nominee Kamala Harris held her election party at her alma mater Howard University in Washington DC.
It started out as a joyous dance party, as young people said they were excited to see the election of the first woman of colour to the White House.
Harris always had her work cut out for her in this race.
She was catapulted to the top of the presidential ticket in July when her boss, President Joe Biden stepped aside due to concerns about his mental acuity.
For a shot at victory, everything had to go right in an achingly tight race. But as soon as polls closed, it quickly became apparent it wouldn't go her way.
When the crucial swing state of Georgia was called for Trump by CNN, witnesses say the mood at Harris's part in DC became very grim indeed.
As the party emptied out, Harris's campaign chair Jen O'Malley Dillon sent an email to staffers, in which she urged them to "get some sleep".
"As we have known all along, this is a razor thin race," she wrote.
"This is what we've been built for, so let's finish up what we have in front of us tonight, get some sleep and get ready to close out strong tomorrow."
It's expected we won't hear from the vice-president until tomorrow.
The women vote
The gender divide among voters was a key focus this election, with uncertainty about how this split would play out on polling day and what it would mean for each candidate.
Early surveys indicated there was a slight increase in the number of American women who cast ballots on November 5.
Data from AP's VoteCast survey shows 54 per cent of voters are women in 2024, up from 53 per cent in 2020.
Republicans were aware coming into election day that female voters could make or break Trump's fortunes, with one of his closest advisers, Stephen Miller, going so far as to urge men to get to the polls to counteract the surge.
A key concern was how women would vote in the wake of the Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe vs Wade in 2022, which ended the constitutional right to abortion and sent the issue back to the states.
Trump's appointment of three conservative justices to the court during his presidency paved the way for the ruling, which resulted in more than 20 states introducing bans or restrictions on abortion.
After Kamala Harris became the Democratic nominee, the number of women who named abortion as their top election issue increased, according to New York Times/Siena polls.
The Vice-President and her team campaigned heavily on the issue, insisting Trump can't be trusted on reproductive access.
But the much-discussed "gender chasm" didn't appear to work in Harris' favour.
That's despite the Democratic presidential candidate clearly dominating among younger voters, according to exit polls.
ABC America found that while young men under 30 were evenly split between Harris and Trump, the Democrat held a 26-point lead with women in the same age group.
It came as polls found a higher share of younger voters took part in this election.
AP's VoteCast survey found 16 per cent of voters were 18-29-year-olds. In 2020 they made up 13 per cent of voters.
Surveys have previously found the younger age group are irregular voters and are less connected to either party.
Republicans secure the Senate but the House is still in play
While the focus for many Americans was on the outcome of the presidential race, the battles for the US House of Representatives and the Senate are arguably even more crucial.
Republicans secured control of the Senate early on election night, retaking the chamber for the first time in four years.
But control of the House of Representatives remains in doubt, with The Associated Press reporting dozens of races are yet to be called.
It could be hours before an outcome is finalised, with tight contests taking place across the country.
If the Republicans win both chambers of congress it will pave the way for Trump's agenda to be enacted in full.
Fake Melania, bomb threats and disinformation
While the voting process was largely calm on November 5, it belied a suffocating sense of anxiety among voters who were awaiting the outcome of a razor's-edge election race.
On the ground, voters took part in their election day rituals, wiling away the time by exercising, catching up with friends or gathering for democracy parties.
But social media platforms quickly became a hotbed of conspiracy theories and misinformation ranging from mild claims about a fake Melania Trump to more dangerous allegations of voter fraud and election rigging in Pennsylvania.
When Trump showed up to a Florida precinct to cast his vote early on November 5, social media users were convinced the woman photographed by his side was not his wife Melania but a body double.
People honed in on her decision to wear sunglasses indoors, missing rings and her choice of dress as signs the former first lady had been replaced by a look-a-like.
There is no evidence to suggest Melania is using a body double but it was not the only sign of things going awry on election day.
Bomb threats across precincts in four states caused disruptions as some were forced to temporarily close.
The FBI said many of the threat claims "appear to originate from Russian email domains" and "none of the threats have been determined to be credible thus far".
Georgia's Republican secretary of state was one of many officials who spoke out against the threats.
Meanwhile, one of the common threads that took hold early in the day was allegations of voter fraud and election rigging in Pennsylvania, a key battleground state for both parties.
Thousands of accounts on social media platform X shared a video as evidence of the "fraud", however the ABC Verify team has found the footage is old and a widely debunked video of election workers in Arizona that was filmed in 2022 ahead of the US mid-terms.
Reuters has previously reported that what the video actually shows is a "routine procedure to install memory cards into voter machines".
