Election 2023 was a night of huge success for some and an evening of acknowledging defeat for others.
There was visible jubilation at The National Party's campaign event after successfully securing enough seats to form a coalition with its allies on the right of politics.
And it was a golden moment of victory for leader Christopher Luxon, who defeated Labour to step up to become the nation's 42nd Prime Minister.
It marks a rapid rise for Luxon, former Air New Zealand CEO, who became an MP in 2020 and National leader only a year later.
For the Greens, it was a night to remember, picking up three electorates, and 14 MPs - the most ever, with seven new people coming into Parliament.
NZ First leader Winston Peters returned after three years out of the big house, while ACT picked up a second electorate seat with Brooke van Velden taking Tamaki.
Big night for our young female candidates
New Zealand's young females were the real winners of the evening, with several candidates from our major and minor parties winning seats.
Te Pāti Māori's Hana-Rāwhiti Maipi-Clarke, aged 21, became New Zealand's youngest MP in 170 years, unseating Labour's Nanaia Mahuta with more than 1000 votes.
Meanwhile, Green MP Tamatha Paul, 26, won Wellington Central, stepping up above Labour's Ibrahim Omer and National's Scott Sheeran.
With more success for the Greens, Chloe Swarbrick, 29, retained the Auckland Central electorate, making history as the first in her party to ever do so.
For Labour, Arena Williams, born in 1990, roped in the success after managing to retain her Manurewa electorate.
On the other end of the political spectrum, the ACT Party's Brooke van Velden, 31, won her electorate seat in Tamaki, kicking out National MP Simon O'Connor.
Losses on losses for the Labour Party
Several Labour MPs failed to maintain their seats, with National painting the country blue as the evening ticked on.
One of the biggest losses for Labour on the night was Michael Wood slipping out of place for Mt Roskill, with Carlos Cheung stepping into the role instead. Despite Wood once being considered a possible future Labour leader, this now means he will be completely out of Parliament.
It was a big switch for Auckland's Takanini, the newest electorate after being established in 2020. Anae Neru Leavasa's seat was taken over by Rima Nakhle.
After what was a close race, Damien O'Connor was also booted out of his seat, with Maureen Pugh taking over the West Coast-Tasman electorate.
Running neck to neck, Tracey McLellan was taken out of the Bank Peninsula seat to allow Vanessa Weenink in.
And for New Lynn, Deborah Russell was booted out to move Paulo Garcia in.
Whangārei's seat was flicked back to National territory with Shane Reti replacing Angie Warren-Clark.
Wairarapa was also taken, with Kieran McAnultry being defeated by Mike Butterick.
Minor parties sorely defeated
Some of the minor parties were left out and failed to win any parliamentary seats in the election.
Leaders of some of the parties spoke up with emotion on Sunday, including New Zealand Loyal's Liz Gunn and Freedom NZ's Brian Tamaki.
Gunn described herself as feeling like "a real fraud" after predicting the party would get 2 million votes and only pulling in a total of 7031.
Meanwhile Tamaki slammed National. "What sort of Christians are we breeding?" he asked.
