The votes

In the Republic, the results of the vote to change the constitution in line with the agreement were:

Electorate:	2,753,127
Turnout:	1,545,395 (56%)
Valid votes:	1,528,331
Votes in favour:	1,442,583 (94.4%)
Votes against:	85,748 (5.6%)
Spoiled votes:	17,064

In Northern Ireland, the results of the vote on the agreement were:

Electorate:	1,175,403
Turnout:	953,583 (81%)
Valid votes:	951,845
Votes in favour:	676,966 (71.1%)
Votes against:	274,879 (28.9%)
Spoiled votes	1,738

There is no official breakdown of how the nationalist and unionist communities voted, but CAIN, the Conflict Archive on the Internet, estimated that the overwhelming majority (up to 97%) of members of the largely Catholic nationalist community in Northern Ireland voted 'Yes'. Their estimate of the largely Protestant unionist community's support for the agreement was between 51 and 53 per cent.

Complicating matters for the calculation was the turnout, with a substantial increase over elections in many traditionally unionist areas, whilst the turnout was close to that for elections in staunch nationalist areas. Approximately 147,000 more people voted in the referendum than in the subsequent Assembly elections, though it is estimated that there was also some deliberate abstentions by hardline republican voters.

The referendum was calculated centrally so it is not clear what the geographic spread of voting was, but an exit poll found that out of all eighteen constituencies, only Ian Paisley's North Antrim stronghold voted against the Agreement.

The pro-agreement result was greeted at the time with relief by supporters of the agreement. However, the scale of sceptical and anti-agreement sentiment in the unionist community, their continued misgivings over aspects of the agreement, and differing expectations from the Agreement on the part of the two communities were to cause difficulties in the following years.