Donald Trump vs Hillary Clinton

Donald Trump vs Hillary Clinton: How  US polls

The American presidential election is the longest, most expensive and arguably most watched election on the entire planet.

While the complexities of the American electoral system are not necessarily any worse than those of South Africa, or Mexico or the UK, the amount of money spent prognosticating the election can almost overwhelm anyone who is not intimately familiar with the intricacies and nuances of the system.

Likely the most difficult part of American elections to understand is the flood of polls that come out predicting which candidate is ahead, behind or more likely to win.

Sometimes it is difficult to determine which are reliable and which are just more pre-election noise.

As the American election season winds down to the final days and hours here are three simple rules for being a good poll watcher of American elections.

It's State Not National Polls that Matter

The US presidential election is a two-tiered system; therefore the polls that you pay attention to vary greatly in importance. There are polls for the national popular vote, which is how many Americans vote for a particular major party presidential candidate - in this case either Donald Trump, the Republican, or Hillary Clinton, the Democrat.

Then there is the electoral college, which is essentially a points system whereby the presidential candidates earn a certain amount of points for every state where they win that state's particular popular vote. Electoral college votes are based on the state's population, so for example California has 55 electoral votes while Virginia only has 13