How do voters mark their ballots in a single transferable vote election?

In a single transferable vote (STV) election, voters mark their ballots by ranking candidates in order of their personal preference.1

Rather than selecting only one candidate, a voter indicates their first choice, second choice, third choice, and so on. This system allows a vote to be transferred to a voter's subsequent preferences if their first-choice candidate has already secured enough votes to be elected or has been eliminated due to receiving the fewest votes. By aggregating these ranked preferences, the system ensures that votes are used effectively to fill all available seats in a multimember district.12