This study analyses various factors that can affect the level of budget transparency. It focuses on several political characteristics, investigating a pool of 95 countries for the years 2006, 2008, 2010, 2012 and 2015. Findings from this study indicate that both governments’ characteristics and the characteristics of political and electoral systems affect the level of budget transparency. These results extend findings from previous literature on determinants of open budgets by using a more extended period and additional political and electoral features, and also by adopting an international comparative approach.