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Free tool · runs on your device · updated October 11, 2026

Social Security Break-Even Calculator

Claiming Social Security at 62 pays a smaller check for more years. Waiting until 70 pays up to 77% more each month for fewer years. The break-even age is when waiting catches up. Enter the figures from your Social Security statement to see your checks, your break-even ages, what a surviving spouse would get, and whether your income covers your bills.

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The boxes start filled with example numbers. Replace them with yours and the results update as you type.

About you
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On your Social Security statement at ssa.gov/myaccount, use the estimate for your full retirement age.

Not sure what age to plan to? If you are in good health and your parents lived into their 90s, plan long. SSA's life expectancy calculator gives a starting point.

Married?
Your money each month
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Medicare Part B is added to your expenses automatically from age 65 ($202.90 a month in 2026), because most people pay it out of their check.

Raises and inflation
Show money as

Social Security's raise follows an official inflation index. If you expect your own costs, like health care and groceries, to rise faster than your raises, set inflation higher than the raise and the calculator shows what your check really buys over time. "Today's buying power" is the fair way to compare claiming ages. "Dollars on the check" shows the bigger numbers you will actually see.

Your results

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How the break-even age works

Social Security pays the same lifetime value on average whichever age you choose. What changes is the shape: a smaller check that starts sooner, or a bigger one that starts later. The break-even age is the birthday when the total from waiting catches up with the total from starting early.

Here is someone born in 1960 or later, whose statement shows $2,000 a month at full retirement age, which is 67 for anyone born in 1960 or later:

Claim atMonthly checkShare of the full amount
62$1,40070%
67$2,000100%
70$2,480124%

Waiting from 62 to 70 overtakes claiming at 62 at about 80 years and 4 months. Live past that and waiting paid more in total. Die before it and the early check did.

Why married couples should look at the higher earner

When one spouse dies, the survivor keeps the larger of the two checks, not both. So the higher earner's claiming age decides what the surviving spouse lives on, possibly for many years.

If that same $2,000 earner claims at 70, a surviving spouse at full retirement age can receive the whole $2,480. Claiming at 62 still leaves the survivor at least $1,650, because SSA guarantees 82.5% of the full amount when the deceased claimed early. That gap of $830 a month is the strongest argument for the higher earner to wait. The calculator shows it for your own numbers in the survivor column.

A lower-earning spouse can also receive a spousal benefit of up to half the higher earner's full amount, but only once the higher earner has filed. Waiting past full retirement age does not raise a spousal benefit.

Raises, inflation and what your check really buys

Every January, Social Security raises checks by a cost-of-living adjustment tied to an official inflation index. Over the last 20 raises it has averaged about 2.5% a year. Over the last 10, about 3.1%, lifted by 5.9% in 2022 and 8.7% in 2023. Since 1975, about 3.7%.

If prices rise exactly as fast as your raises, your check buys the same groceries at 85 that it bought at 67, and the claiming math does not change. The risk retirees feel is the gap: when your own costs climb faster than your raises, the check buys a little less every year. Over 20 years, raises of 2.5% against inflation of 3.5% leave a check buying about 18% less than the day it started.

That gap pushes break-even ages later, because a dollar received early buys more than a dollar received late. Set the two selectors in the calculator to your own expectations and watch the break-even ages move. Keep "Today's buying power" on to compare claiming ages fairly. Switch to "Dollars on the check" to see the larger amounts printed on future checks.

Working while collecting before full retirement age

If you claim before full retirement age and keep working, SSA holds back $1 of benefits for every $2 you earn above $24,480 in 2026. In the year you reach full retirement age, it holds back $1 for every $3 above $65,160, counting only the months before your birthday month. From full retirement age on, there is no limit.

The money held back is not lost. When you reach full retirement age, SSA raises your monthly check to credit the months it withheld. It does mean an early claim while working full time can pay little or nothing for a while. The earnings limit calculator shows which of your checks SSA would stop, year by year, and how much bigger your check becomes at full retirement age.

What this calculator leaves out

  • Taxes in detail. It flags whether up to 50% or 85% of your benefit may count as taxable income. Your actual tax depends on your whole return; the Social Security tax calculator runs the full IRS worksheet.
  • Higher Medicare premiums. Higher incomes pay more than the standard Part B premium. The calculator uses the standard amount; the IRMAA calculator shows what your income adds.
  • Divorced-spouse benefits and claiming a survivor benefit first and your own later. The spousal and survivor calculator covers both. Disability benefits need SSA or a specialist.
  • Investment returns on what you didn't spend. Totals are simple sums, not discounted. The savings line lets you pick a growth rate after inflation. To test your savings against real market history instead, use the how long will my money last calculator.
  • Medicare premiums rising faster than inflation. Part B is assumed to rise with the inflation you choose. In recent years it has often risen faster.
  • Exact birthdays. SSA treats someone born on the 1st of a month as born the month before, and the calculator works in whole months.

For married couples with complicated records, the free Open Social Security calculator models more claiming strategies than this one does.

Before you file

This page is arithmetic, not advice. I'm not a financial adviser, and your own situation may include things no calculator sees. Confirm your figures in your my Social Security account, and call SSA at 1-800-772-1213 before you file. Once you claim, you have 12 months to withdraw your application, and only once.

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