BERLIN — German opposition leader Friedrich Merz's conservatives were on course for a lackluster victory in a national election Sunday, while Alternative for Germany nearly doubled its support, the strongest showing for a far-right party since World War II, projections showed.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz conceded defeat for his center-left Social Democrats after what he called ''a bitter election result.'' Projections for ARD and ZDF public television showed his party finishing in third place with its worst postwar result in a national parliamentary election.

Merz vowed to move quickly to put together a coalition government. But it wasn't immediately clear how easy that will be.

A discontented nation

The election took place seven months earlier than originally planned after Scholz's unpopular coalition collapsed in November, three years into a term that was increasingly marred by infighting. There was widespread discontent and not much enthusiasm for any of the candidates.

The campaign was dominated by worries about the years-long stagnation of Europe's biggest economy and pressure to curb migration — something that caused friction after Merz pushed hard in recent weeks for a tougher approach. It took place against a background of growing uncertainty over the future of Ukraine and Europe's alliance with the United States.

Germany is the most populous country in the 27-nation European Union and a leading member of NATO. It has been Ukraine's second-biggest weapons supplier, after the U.S. It will be central to shaping the continent's response to the challenges of the coming years, including the Trump administration's confrontational foreign and trade policy.

The projections, based on exit polls and partial counting, put support for Merz's Union bloc at just under 29% and Alternative for Germany, or AfD, about 20% — roughly double its result from 2021.

They put support for Scholz's Social Democrats at just over 16%, far lower than in the last election and below their previous all-time low of 20.5% from 2017. The environmentalist Greens, their remaining partners in the outgoing government, were on 12-13%.

Out of three smaller parties, one — the hard-left Left Party — strengthened its position, winning up to 9% of the vote after a remarkable comeback during the campaign. Two other parties, the pro-business Free Democrats and the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance, hovered around the threshold of the 5% support needed to win seats.

A difficult task for the winner

Whether Merz will have a majority to form a coalition with Scholz's Social Democrats or need a second partner as well will depend on how many parties get into parliament. The conservative leader said that "the most important thing is to re-establish a viable government in Germany as quickly as possible.''

''I am aware of the responsibility,'' Merz said. "I am also aware of the scale of the task that now lies ahead of us. I approach it with the utmost respect, and I know that it will not be easy.''

''The world out there isn't waiting for us, and it isn't waiting for long-drawn-out coalition talks and negotiations,'' he told cheering supporters. ''We must now become capable of acting quickly again."

The Greens' candidate for chancellor, Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck, said that Merz would do well to moderate his tone after a sometimes hard-fought election campaign.

''We have seen the center is weakened overall, and everyone should look at themselves and ask whether they didn't contribute to that,'' said Habeck. ''Now he must see that he acts like a chancellor.''

The Greens were the party that suffered least from participating in Scholz's unpopular government. The Social Democrats' general secretary, Matthias Miersch, suggested that their defeat was no surprise — ''this election wasn't lost in the last eight weeks.''

A delighted far-right party

AfD's candidate for chancellor, Alice Weidel, said that ''we have become the second-strongest force." The party's strongest previous showing was 12.6% in 2017, when it first entered the national parliament.

She said that her party is ''open for coalition negotiations'' with Merz's party, and that ''otherwise, no change of policy is possible in Germany.'' But Merz has repeatedly and categorically ruled out working with AfD, as have other mainstream parties.

AfD co-leader Tino Chrupalla told cheering supporters that ''we have achieved something historic today.''

''We have gained 100%," he said. "We are now the political center and we have left the fringes behind us.''

Scholz decried AfD's success. He said that "that must never be something that we will accept. I will not accept it and never will.''

The head of Germany's main Jewish organization, Josef Schuster, told daily newspaper Die Welt: ''It must concern us all that a fifth of German voters are giving their vote to a party that is at least partly right-wing extremist, that openly seeks linguistic and ideological links to right-wing radicalism and neo-Nazism, that plays on people's fears and only offers them ostensible solutions.''

More than 59 million people in the nation of 84 million were eligible to elect the 630 members of the lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, who will take their seats under the glass dome of Berlin's landmark Reichstag building.

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Associated Press journalists Kirsten Grieshaber, Vanessa Gera and Stefanie Dazio in Berlin contributed.