This article examines the impact of direct presidential elections on legislative party systems. We argue that presidential power shapes the effective number of presidential candidates in a way that will have a reductive effect on the legislative party system, but this reduction will be observed only within an intermediary range of presidential power. We also argue that this proposition should be tested solely on the population of countries with direct presidential elections. We find that the effect of presidential coattails is less important than has typically been suggested, that by contrast presidential power has an influence on the legislative party system, but also that we need to think carefully about how to capture variation in presidential power when trying to estimate its effect. This latter point applies to the debate about the determinants of the legislative party system but also to debates about the effect of presidential power more generally.