Australians might know not for a month the make-up of the new parliament.
And a second poll to resolve Saturday's inconclusive result is not out of the question.
Australian Electoral Commission spokesman Phil Diak said more than 11 million ballots for the House of Representatives had been counted already.
But it could take up to a month for the rest to be tallied.
"The commission won't declare seats until there's a mathematical impossibility of the leader being overtaken, as it were, in any seat," he told ABC TV on Sunday.
"So that's often a lot later than when victory is claimed or a seat is conceded."
As it stands now, the coalition appears to have 72 of the 150 lower house seats, Labor 67, the Greens 1 and independents 4.
Another six seats are in doubt.
The coalition leads in two - Dunkley (VIC) and Gilmore (NSW) - while Labor has the lead in Chisholm (VIC), Forde, Herbert (QLD) and Hindmarsh (SA).
The AEC will count votes from mobile centres on Sunday that are unlikely to have any impact on the overall count.
More than one million postal votes have been returned to the commission so far and more can be accepted if they are received by Friday week.
The Senate count could take up to five weeks.
