Danish Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt concedes defeat in elections that saw her left-leaning bloc lose to the centre-right opposition.

"We won the election campaign but did not win the elections. We were beaten on the finish line," she tells members of her Social Democratic party.

She also announced her resignation as party leader saying "it is the right time," and that she later Friday will hand in her government's resignation, saying opposition leader Lars Lokke Rasmussen inherits "a Denmark in good shape, dpa reported