The first recorded election in Shelby County was held at the county courthouse in April 1827. Voters used hand-written paper ballots.
Pre-printed ballots were used for the first time the early 1900s. Votes were tallied at the courthouse.
In 1950, it took nearly 40 hours to tabulate the results, which prompted a public call for the use of mechanical voting equipment.
In 1958, 131 years after Shelby County’s first election, voting machines were purchased. More than 700 voting machines were purchased at a total cost of $710,000.
Electronic voting devices, Shouptronic voting machines, were purchased in 1986.
Touch-screen direct record electronic (DRE) machines were purchased for early voting in 1998. The machines were manufactured by Global Election Company, which was acquired by Diebold by 2006. The county began using DRE machines because the Shuptronic machines could not accommodate the longest ballot ever seen in Shelby County. The county spent $4.2 million for those machines.
In 2022, new machines were purchased from ES&S. These machines included precinct based digital scanners which are capable of tabulating both hand marked and machine marked ballots. This upgrade allowed voters to choose either a hand marked paper ballot or a ballot marking device ballot. The county spent $5.8 million for these machines.
