Elections to East Ayrshire Council were held on 3 May 2012, the same day as the other Scottish local government elections. The election is the second using 9 new wards created as a result of the Local Governance (Scotland) Act 2004, each ward elected three or four councillors using the single transferable vote system form of proportional representation. The new wards replaced 32 single-member wards which used the plurality (first past the post) system of election.
Note: "Votes" are the first preference votes. The net gain/loss and percentage changes relate to the result of the previous Scottish local elections on 3 May 2007. This may differ from other published sources showing gain/loss relative to seats held at dissolution of Scotland's councils.
|- class="unsortable" align="centre" ! rowspan="2" style="text-align:left;"|Ward ! % !Cllrs ! % !Cllrs ! % !Cllrs ! % !Cllrs ! % !Cllrs !rowspan=2|Total<br />Cllrs |- class="unsortable" style="text-align:center;" !colspan=2|SNP !colspan=2|Labour !colspan=2|Conservative !colspan=2|Lib Dem !colspan=2|Independent |- |align="left"|Annick | |1 | |1 | |0 | |0 | |1 |3 |- |align="left"|Kilmarnock North | |2 | |1 | |0 |colspan=2 |colspan=2 |3 |- |Kilmarnock West and Crosshouse | |2 | |1 | |1 |colspan=2 | |0 |4 |- |align="left"|Kilmarnock East and Hurlford | |2 | |2 | |0 |colspan=2 |colspan=2 | 4 |- |align="left"|Kilmarnock South | |2 | |1 | |0 |colspan=2 |colspan=2 |3 |- |align="left"|Irvine Valley | |2 | |1 | |1 |colspan=2 | |0 |4 |- |align="left"|Ballochmyle | |2 | |2 | |0 |colspan=2 |colspan=2 |4 |- |align="left"|Cumnock and New Cumnock | |1 | |3 | |0 |colspan=2 | |0 |4 |- |align="left"|Doon Valley | |1 | |2 | |0 |colspan=2 | |0 |3 |- class="unsortable" !align="left"|Total ! !15 ! !14 ! !2 ! !0 ! !1 !32
The SNP and Labour retained the seats they had won at the previous election while independent candidate Ellen Freel gained a seat from the Conservatives <onlyinclude></onlyinclude>
The SNP (2) and Labour retained the seats they won at the previous election. <onlyinclude></onlyinclude>
The SNP (2), Labour and the Conservatives retained the seats they had won at the previous election. <onlyinclude></onlyinclude>
The SNP (2) and Labour (2) retained the seats they had won at the previous election. <onlyinclude></onlyinclude>
The SNP (2) and Labour retained the seats they had won at the previous election. <onlyinclude></onlyinclude>
The SNP (2), Labour and the Conservatives retained the seats they had won at the previous election. <onlyinclude></onlyinclude>
Labour retained two of the three seats they had won at the previous election while the SNP held their only seat and gained one seat from Labour. <onlyinclude></onlyinclude>
Labour (3) and the SNP retained the seats that they had won at the previous election. <onlyinclude></onlyinclude>
The SNP and Labour retained the seats they had won at the previous election while Labour gained one seat from independent councillor Jim Sutherland. In 2007, independent candidate Drew Filson was elected as an SNP councillor but subsequently left the party. A by-election held following the death of Cllr Sutherland in 2009 was won by Labour. <onlyinclude></onlyinclude>
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