General elections were held in Sweden on 19 September 2010 to elect the 349 members of the Riksdag. The main contenders of the election were the governing centre-right coalition the Alliance, consisting of the Moderate Party, the Centre Party, the Liberal People's Party and the Christian Democrats; and the opposition centre-left coalition the Red-Greens, consisting of the Social Democrats, the Left Party and the Green Party.

The Alliance received 49.27 percent of the votes (an increase by 1.03 pp from the previous election) and 173 seats in the parliament (a decrease by 5 seats and 2 short of an overall majority), while the Red-Greens received 43.60 percent of the vote (a decrease by 2.48 pp) and 156 seats (a decrease by 15 seats). The election also saw the nationalist Sweden Democrats entering parliament for the first time, as the sixth largest and only non-aligned of the eight parties elected to the parliament, by receiving 5.70 percent of the votes (an increase by 2.77 pp) and 20 seats. Both in terms of percentage share; 30.06%, and the actual vote; 1,791,766, the Moderate Party had its strongest election of the unicameral parliamentary era, narrowly missing out on beating the Social Democrats to become the largest party. The Alliance dominated the Stockholm capital region of the municipality and county and made further gains in South Sweden including narrowly flipping Malmö blue as well as winning pluralities in traditionally red towns such as Kalmar, Landskrona and Trelleborg.

The Alliance lost its absolute majority in the parliament but continued to govern as a minority government. The new parliament held its opening session on 5 October, with Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt presenting the annual government policy statement, along with changes to his cabinet.

This was the first time in almost a century that a Swedish centre-right government that had served a full term was reelected.

One of the main campaign themes was the Economy of Sweden.

The Sweden Democrats (SD) stated that it wished to cut political asylum and family reunification immigration by 90 percent. The SD leader Jimmie Åkesson wrote, in an opinion piece for the social-democratic tabloid Aftonbladet that the growth of the country's Muslim population "is the greatest foreign threat to Sweden since the Second World War."

The parties already represented in the Swedish parliament, along with the Swedish television networks, excluded minor parties from the televised political debates. The excluded minor parties included the Sweden Democrats, the June List, the Feminist Initiative, and the Pirate Party.^{[citation needed]}

After the election in September 2006, the Alliance slipped well behind the opposition in the polls. A Sifo poll conducted in February 2008 showed the opposition leading the Alliance by 19.4%. However, this lead steadily eroded during the second half of the Alliance's term, despite the opposition's uniting in the Red-Green co-operation in December 2008.