What differences exist between end-of-term approval and average approval for recent presidents?
Executive summary
End‑of‑term approval is a single snapshot — the final job‑approval percentage recorded when a president leaves office — while average approval is a time‑weighted measure calculated across the entire presidency; the American Presidency Project publishes final (end‑of‑term) ratings and polling organizations or aggregators (Gallup, NYT, Nate Silver, Reuters/Ipsos) provide ongoing averages and trackers [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]. Aggregates show modern presidents often finish with end‑of‑term figures that differ substantially from their multi‑year averages because crises, wars, scandals and economic cycles push polling up and down over time [6] [7].
1. Approval vs. average — two different portraits of popularity
End‑of‑term approval is the definitive closing score preserved in datasets such as the American Presidency Project’s “Final Presidential Job Approval Ratings” — a single number that reporters and historians quote to summarize public judgment at departure [1]. Average approval is calculated from serial polls across a term and smooths short‑term volatility; practitioners such as Nate Silver’s Silver Bulletin, The New York Times and Gallup present rolling or weighted averages that reflect performance across many months and events [3] [4] [2]. Both are legitimate metrics but they answer different questions: “How did the public view this president at the end?” versus “How popular was this president on average while governing?” [1] [3].
2. Why they diverge — events, timing and averaging mechanics
Divergence between an end‑of‑term number and an average arises because averages integrate peaks and troughs — e.g., honeymoon boosts, wartime rallies, economic downturns — while the end‑of‑term score can reflect recent shocks such as scandals or a recession. Coverage of Trump’s recent polling illustrates this: Gallup and other trackers showed declines in late 2025 tied to a prolonged government shutdown and related controversies, producing low singles for his instant approval (36% Gallup) even while longer trackers and aggregators reported somewhat different multi‑poll averages [2] [8] [7]. Aggregators weight polls and may use slightly different samples (adults, registered or likely voters), which changes averages relative to any single end‑of‑term poll [3] [4].
3. How different outlets produce different “averages”
Nate Silver’s Silver Bulletin explicitly weights polls for reliability and typically uses the all‑adult versions of surveys, which produces a daily‑updated average distinct from other aggregators [3]. The New York Times maintains its own dataset and documents methodological differences from predecessors like FiveThirtyEight [4]. Gallup produces individual periodic polls and historical Gallup series are often used for long‑run comparisons [2] [6]. These methodological choices — pollster weighting, voter universe, and smoothing windows — explain why “average approval” is not a single universal number but a cluster of close estimates [3] [4].
4. Historical perspective — what researchers and archives preserve
Academic and archival resources such as the American Presidency Project collect final job‑approval figures for presidents and are frequently cited in retrospective comparisons [1]. Gallup’s historical work documents that retrospective or final approvals can differ markedly from contemporaneous averages; for example, Gallup’s historical statistics note broad variation in how presidents are viewed in hindsight [6]. The Economist and other outlets use trackers across terms to project state‑level and demographic trends, underlining that averages reveal structural patterns that a single end‑of‑term snapshot can obscure [7].
5. How journalists and historians use each measure
Journalists use end‑of‑term approval as a shorthand verdict — a tidy figure for headlines and historical tables [1]. Analysts and pollwatchers use rolling averages to trace momentum and to contextualize why a final number looks the way it does, pointing to midterm shifts, policy crises or scandal cycles [3] [4] [2]. The recent reporting on Trump shows both practices: headlines highlight the new second‑term low from a Gallup poll (36%) while commentators consult multiple trackers to assess whether that low is a persistent trend or a short‑term trough [2] [8].
6. Limitations, competing viewpoints and what’s not covered
Available sources document the measurement differences and show recent polling for President Trump, including Gallup’s 36% and various tracker averages, but they do not provide a single universally agreed formula for converting multi‑year averages into an “equivalent” end‑of‑term score; methodological choices matter [2] [3] [4]. Sources note demographic and state splits in approval but do not in this sample present a complete table comparing end‑of‑term vs. average for multiple recent presidents — that comprehensive cross‑presidential dataset is not found in the current reporting [1] [6].
Conclusion: Use end‑of‑term approval for a concise historical verdict and polling averages to understand a president’s full trajectory; consult the archive (American Presidency Project) for final numbers and multiple aggregators (Gallup, Silver Bulletin, NYT, Reuters/Ipsos) to see how averages and snapshots can tell different stories [1] [2] [3] [4] [5].