Sixty-three percent of Americans say a third U.S. political party is needed, up from 56% a year ago and by one percentage point the highest in Gallup's 20-year trend.
Third party will never ever happen with the electoral college. Whichever party forms a third party and said third party will both lose 100% of the time.
It about making the guys who you hate least lose, ironically. Voting against the other guy is already baked into FPTP, so if you vote for a 3rd party you're voting against both the main parties. Except the party you hate the most would've already gotten your anti-vote anyway, so really you're just adding an anti-vote to the other party, which is adding a handicap to them that wasn't there before.
The electoral college has less of an impact than fptp voting IMO. Ranked choice or Star voting would actually allow third party candidates to win local elections at least.