Gender has become a hot button issue in the Arab world, particularly after the Arab spring, when parliamentary gender quotas were introduced or maintained in Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt and other countries. At the same time, little is known about barriers to female candidates at the polls. Using data from an original survey of 1200 Tunisians and 4800 Egyptians conducted in 2012, this paper considers whether and why gendered stereotypes affect support for male and female candidates in Tunisia and Egypt. The study asks respondents how likely they would be to vote for candidates with stereotypically female roles (i.e. working in a civil society organization that provides school supplies for children) and stereotypically male roles (i.e. a successful business person). Using an experimental design, it randomly presents respondents with either a male or female candidate. The results show that while female candidates are always less popular than the male candidates, the gap in support for the male versus the female candidate is small when the candidate is involved in civil society and large when the candidate is a business person. This study shows the impact of gendered stereotypes on potential voters’ willingness to support women candidates.