Almost twice as many people cast ballots in B.C., as did in the last federal election, according to numbers just released by Elections Canada.

Preliminary figures show 507,920 ballots were cast in the advance vote, up 96 per cent from 259,278 in the 2011 advance polls.

Some individual ridings, including Merritt, B.C., saw advance polls run out of ballots, despite a supply from Elections Canada of double the number required in 2011.

The greatest provincial increase was in Alberta, where advance voter turnout was up 124 per cent. In Nunavut, turnout more than tripled last election's advance polls, but was only 1109.

Across Canada, voter turnout in the advance polls was 3.63 million, up 73 per cent compared to the 2011 federal election.

Chart of advance voter turnout across Canada