Angela Merkel clinched a fourth term as chancellor of Germany. Her party, the Christian Democrats (CDU), picked up 32.5 percent of the votes in Sunday's election, according to the first exit polls issued at 6 pm German local time.
Merkel's conservative bloc garnered between 32.5 and 33.5 per cent, well ahead of the second placed Social Democratic Party with 20-21 per cent, national broadcasters ARD and ZDF said in separate exit polls.
The hard-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) clinched third spot, obtaining between 13 and 13.5 per cent of the vote, they added.
The four-year-old party with links to the far-right French National Front and Britain's UKIP has been shunned by Germany's mainstream.
It is now headed for the opposition benches of the Bundestag lower house, dramatically boosting its visibility and state financing.
Alarmed by the prospect of what foreign minister Sigmar Gabriel branded 'real Nazis' entering the Bundestag for the first time since World War II, the candidates had used their final days of campaigning to implore voters to reject the populists.
'This Alternative for Germany is no alternative. They are a shame for our nation,' former European Parliament chief Schulz told a rally in Berlin on Friday.
Germans elected a highly splintered parliament reflecting an electorate torn between a high degree of satisfaction with Merkel and a desire for change after more than a decade of her leadership.
Another three parties cleared the five-per cent hurdle to representations: the liberal Free Democrats (around 10 per cent), anti-capitalist Left and ecologist Greens (both at about nine per cent).
As Merkel failed to secure a ruling majority on her own, the process of coalition building was shaping up to be a thorny, potentially months-long process.

PTI