The three main political parties look set to be locked in a stalemate following tonight's exit poll results.
The Ipsos/MRBI poll shows that Fianna Fail, Fine Gael and Sinn Fein are all polling at around 22% first preference votes.
A breakdown of tonight's poll shows Fianna Fail at 22.2%, Fine Gael at 22.4% an Sinn Fein at 22.3%.
The margin of error in the exit poll is 1.3%.
Sinn Fein have had their highest polling ever.
The Green Party are currently at 7.9%, followed Labour (4%), Social Democrats (3%), People Before Profit (3%) with Independents polling at 11%.
It was a stunning turnaround for the Government party of Fine Gael.
They were looking like they were in freefall, but now could theoretically challenge again to be the lead parry in seats after the counting is done.
There was a mixture of jubilation and confusion among the party hierarchies of Fine Gael, Sinn Féin and Fianna Fáil last night, as the poll was really unexpected.
Nobody really lost on the exit poll findings
Fine Gael were as low as 20% in opinion polls, Sinn Féin were riding high at up to 25%, with fears they would plummet after a bad week, and Fianna Fáil hovering at around 23% worried they might fall between the two stools.
But what can be said for now is that it is virtually impossible to see how exactly the votes will spread in the next day or two, with the last seats in the majority of constituencies going to go down to the wire.
Counting will officially begin first thing tomorrow morning at 9am.
Sampling took place across the country among 5,000 respondents at 250 polling stations in 39 constituencies.
The exit poll was conducted by Ipsos/MRBI for RTE, the Irish Times, TG4 and UCD.
