Mikhail Zygar, the former editor-in-chief of Russia's only independent news channel, Dozhd, wrote in TIME that "Putin's psychology underwent an irreversible transformation" following his term as prime minister.

Putin, who has ruled Russian Federation for nearly two decades, recorded his best ever election performance with 76.67 percent of the vote but rejected the possibility of staying in power indefinitely.

In third place was the ultranationalist leader of the LDPR (formerly known as the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia), Vladimir Zhirinovsky, who got 5.7 percent of the vote.

Overall national turnout was expected to be a little more than 60 percent, which would be several points below turnout in Putin's electoral wins in 2000, 2004 and 2012.

Tsiya Soskina, a 78-year-old retiree in Yekaterinburg, said she did not go to vote because "they're going to decide everything for me anyway".

French leader Emmanuel Macron telephoned Mr Putin to wish Russia and its people success, and the Russian leader is understood to have responded by denying his country's involvement in the poisoning of Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia.

"We will think about the future of our great Motherland", said Putin in a victory speech near Red Square, calling for renewed support after a win that he called a vote of confidence, earned under hard times, according to Reuters.

"We need to say thank you to Great Britain because they again misread the Russian mindset", he said.

Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud also congratulated Putin on his election victory, the Saudi Press Agency said on Monday.

Asked after his re-election if he would run for yet another term in the future, Mr. Putin laughed off the idea."Let's count".

Voters appeared to be turning in out in larger numbers Sunday than in the last presidential election in 2012, when Putin faced a serious opposition movement and there were instances of multiple voting, ballot stuffing and coercion.

The main opposition leader, Alexei Navalny, was barred from the race.

Iranian president Hasan Rouhani also congratulated Putin on his "decisive victory" and vowed to further boost ties between Tehran and Moscow.

The election was held as Russian Federation faces increasing isolation on the world stage over a spy poisoning in Britain and a fresh round of U.S. sanctions just as it gears up for the football World Cup in the summer.

Selfie competitions, giveaways, food festivals and children's entertainers were laid on at polling stations in a bid to create a festive atmosphere around the election. And Komsomolskaya Pravda, the country's best-selling tabloid, said Putin had won an enormous new electoral mandate stemming from a "colossal demand for a response to the piled-up grievances" that Russians have against the West.

The head of Mr Putin's campaign team, Andrei Kondrashov, suggested that the "groundless" British accusations had encouraged voters to rally around the president.

Among those unabashedly singing Putin's praises was the chief editor of one of Russia's most prominent news organizations: RT.

"I was in Kiev exactly one week ago to pass the message of full support both to the full implementation of the Minsk agreements, the non-recognition policy of the annexation of Crimea that we consider illegal", she said.

At home, Putin would face a challenge of how to diversify an economy still dependent on oil and gas and improve medical care and social services in regions far removed from the cosmopolitan glitter of Moscow.

To Russians, Putin's biggest victory in 18 years in power was annexing Crimea and crushing Ukraine's ambitions to move closer to the European Union and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.

Less than three minutes after he stepped on stage, Putin was gone, leaving the crowd to chant "Russia!" and wave their flags in the cold Moscow night without him.