How Are Social Security Spousal Benefits Calculated?

Plus three key ways to maximize your spousal benefits

Reviewed by David KindnessFact checked by Pete Rathburn

If you’re eligible for Social Security spousal benefits, how much you’ll receive depends on a number of factors, including your age, the amount of your spouse’s benefit, and whether you have other retirement benefits available to you. Who’s eligible? Anyone whose spouse, ex-spouse, or deceased spouse was or is eligible for benefits, once you have reached the age of eligibility, is eligible.

The maximum spousal benefit you can receive is 50% of your spouse’s benefit at their full retirement age. The precise amount you’ll get and when you’ll get it depends on several circumstances, including your spouse’s age and past income, your age and past income, and more.

That leaves some room for you to maximize the amount you receive. And if that amount is less than what you’d get based on your own past income, you’ll automatically get the higher amount.

Below, you’ll find out if you qualify for Social Security spousal benefits and how to figure out the amount you’ll get. And, you’ll learn the fate of a couple of once-popular spousal benefits loopholes in the Social Security rules. (Hint: It’s not good news.) Nevertheless, if you know the rules highlighted in this article, you’ll be able to maximize your Social Security spousal benefits.

Key Takeaways

• The maximum spousal benefit is 50% of the other spouse’s full benefit.
• You may be eligible if you’re married, divorced, or widowed.
• You can collect spousal benefits as early as age 62, but in most cases, the benefits are permanently reduced if you start collecting before your full retirement age.
• If your past income earns a higher benefit, you’ll receive that rather than the spousal benefit.
• In 2015, the federal government changed the rules on filing for Social Security spousal benefits, eliminating some claiming strategies that allowed couples to increase their benefits.

Who Qualifies for Social Security Spousal Benefits?

If your spouse has filed for Social Security benefits, you can also collect benefits based on the spouse’s work record, if:

• You are at least 62 years old.
• Regardless of your age, if you care for a child who is entitled to receive benefits on your spouse’s record, and who is under age 16 — or a child who receives Social Security disability benefits. (Note: Even if you make a claim before you reach your full retirement age, your spousal benefits will not be reduced if you’re caring for a child who qualifies under the age or disability rules.)

When you apply for spousal benefits, you’ll also be applying for benefits based on your own work history. If you’re eligible for benefits based on your earnings, and that benefit amount is higher than your spousal benefit, that’s what you’ll get. If it’s lower, you’ll get “a combination of the two benefits that equals the higher amount,” according to the Social Security Administration (SSA).

How Spousal Benefits Are Calculated

Spousal benefits are based on how much the other spouse would receive if that person began collecting Social Security benefits at the full retirement age. It increases gradually from age 66 to 67. For those born in and before 1942, it’s 65. For those born between 1943 and 1959, it’s age 66. For those born after 1960, it’s 67.

No matter when your spouse actually retires, or if your spouse dies, that person’s full benefit amount is relevant to you in calculating your spousal benefit entitlement.

The SSA has an online calculator that shows you the effects of early retirement: that is, the percentage of your spouse’s benefits you will receive, based on your age when you apply.

The short answer to the calculation is this: You’re eligible for half of your spouse’s benefit amount as long as you wait until your full retirement age to apply. The earlier you file, the less you’ll get.

Claiming Early or Late

The amount you receive will depend on when you begin to claim benefits. You can claim spousal benefits as early as age 62, but you won’t receive as much as if you had waited until your own full retirement age. For example, if your full retirement age is 67 and you choose to claim spousal benefits at 62, you’d receive a benefit that’s equal to 34.6% of your spouse’s full benefit amount.

The amount you receive increases with each year you delay. At your full retirement age (age 67 in this example), you’d be eligible for the maximum, which is 50% of your spouse’s full benefit. So there is no incentive to file for spousal benefits later than your own full retirement age.

If You’re Receiving Other Retirement Benefits

The calculation gets a bit more complicated if you are eligible to receive benefits from a government pension or foreign employer that is not covered by Social Security. In that case, you may still be eligible, but the amount will be reduced.

For example, if you have a government pension for which Social Security taxes are not withheld, the amount of your spousal benefit is reduced by two-thirds of the amount of your pension. This is known as a government pension offset.

For example, suppose you are eligible to receive $800 in Social Security spousal benefits and you also get a $300 pension each month from a government employer who didn’t withhold Social Security taxes. Your Social Security payment is reduced by two-thirds of $300, or $200, making your total benefit amount from all sources $900 per month ([$800 – $200] + $300).

Important

An ex-spouse may be eligible for spousal benefits even if the former spouse hasn’t retired yet, as long as you’ve been divorced for at least two years.

Same-Sex Married Couples

Same-sex married couples have enjoyed the same rights as all other couples since the 2015 Supreme Court ruling affirming their constitutional rights to marriage recognition. And that means same-sex couples are eligible for Social Security spousal benefits.

Social Security also recognizes some non-marital legal relationships such as civil unions and domestic partnerships.

Spousal Benefits for Divorced Spouses

If you’re divorced, you may be eligible for spousal benefits based on your ex-spouse’s work record. The rules are much the same, plus:

• Your marriage must have lasted for at least 10 years.
• You must currently be unmarried.

Even if your former spouse hasn’t filed for benefits yet, you can still file for spousal benefits if you have been divorced for at least two years. However, you must be at least 62 years old, and your spouse must be old enough to qualify for benefits.

If your ex-spouse has died, you may apply for Social Security survivors benefits.

Survivors Benefits for Widows and Widowers

With Social Security survivors benefits, a widow or widower can receive up to 100% of a spouse’s benefit amount if the survivor has reached full retirement age at the time of the application.

The payment is reduced to somewhere between 71 ½ % and 99% of the deceased’s benefits if the widowed person is at least 60 years old but younger than full retirement age.

So it pays to hold off until you reach your full retirement age to maximize the amount you’ll receive.

Disabled surviving spouses can apply for survivors benefits as early as age 50.

You may be eligible for benefits even if your spouse died long before reaching retirement age. Here’s how it works: every employee or self-employed worker racks up Social Security credits for working. In 2024, one credit equals $1,730 of income. Once you’ve earned $6,920 (four credits), you’ve maxed out your credits for the year. If your deceased spouse earned 40 credits—that’s ten years of work with at least $6,920 in earnings per year—a spousal benefit was earned.

Also, if you are receiving spousal benefits and your spouse dies, you need to notify the SSA. Once you do so, your spousal benefit (of up to 50% of your partner’s full retirement age benefit) will convert to a survivor benefit (of up to 100%). And do it promptly. It’s not usually retroactive.

Spousal Benefits Loopholes

You may hear or read about other ways to increase the amount of your spousal benefit. Unfortunately, under new Social Security rules, two popular strategies have been abolished.

The File and Suspend Strategy

Prior to 2016, workers could file for benefits (making their partners eligible to claim spousal benefits), then suspend their own benefits in order to maximize their credits for deferred filing. This so-called file and suspend strategy meant that a lower-income partner could take advantage of spousal benefits while the primary earner accrued delayed retirement credits, thereby increasing their benefit amount.

However, this “have your cake and eat it, too” loophole was closed with the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015, which took effect in April 2016.

While it is still possible to file for benefits and then suspend payments temporarily, any other benefits that would normally be available on your account (such as spousal benefits) are no longer payable during such suspensions.

Deemed Filing

The 2015 law also stopped people born after Jan. 1, 1954, from double-dipping by claiming spousal benefits while accruing delayed retirement credits on their own accounts.

Previously, it was possible for those eligible for both types of benefits to claim spousal benefits first, while delaying a claim on their own account, a process sometimes called a restricted application. This allowed taxpayers to benefit from the earlier spousal payment while maximizing their own benefits through delayed retirement credits.

Under current law, spouses born after Jan. 1, 1954, are deemed to have filed for any and all benefits for which they are eligible as soon as they file for any of them. The payments they receive are based on whichever benefit amount is the highest.

Strategies for Maximizing Spousal Benefits

Every married couple has to figure out the best way to maximize their benefits depending on their own circumstances.

The three strategies below will help you make the most of your Social Security spousal benefits, depending on your circumstances. However, keep in mind that, regardless of your circumstances, the most a spouse can get is 50% of the amount that the higher-earning partner is entitled to at full retirement age.

1. Strategy for Late Claimers

If one partner has little or no earnings history, the best strategy is for the wage earner to postpone applying for Social Security retirement benefits until age 70 to get the highest amount possible. Full retirement age is 66 for most baby boomers and 67 for everyone born in 1960 or later, but by delaying claiming benefits until age 70, the wage-earner will accrue delayed retirement credits that will increase the monthly payments by a certain percentage for each year of delay. For people born in 1943 or later, it’s 8% per year.

Keep in mind that this won’t affect the spousal benefit amount. If you delay claiming for personal retirement benefits past full retirement age, the benefit increases over time. However, that will have no impact on your spouse’s benefits, since they max out at full retirement age. In other words, there is no benefit for your spouse in delaying the spousal benefit claim past your full retirement age.

On the other hand, if both spouses work, and their earnings are more or less equal, their individual Social Security benefits will each be greater than the spousal benefit, so the best strategy for both is to postpone applying for benefits until age 70.

2. Strategy for Divorced Spouses

If you’ve been divorced for at least two years, you can apply for spousal benefits if your marriage lasted 10 or more years. Or if you are still married and are considering a divorce, and are near retirement age, try to apply for spousal benefits before your divorce is final. If you have been married and divorced multiple times, you can choose to receive whichever spousal benefit is highest.

3. Strategy for Widowed Spouses

Widows and widowers may receive full survivors benefits at their full retirement age or reduced benefits as early as age 60. And if you remarry, you may apply for spousal benefits based on your new spouse’s record instead, depending on the circumstances.

If you are collecting a survivor benefit but also qualify for your own retirement benefit, you may wish to collect a survivor benefit in the early years of retirement and leave your retirement benefits to accrue delayed retirement credits. Then you can collect your own retirement benefit at age 70.

How Do Social Security Spousal Benefits Work?

You’re eligible for spousal benefits if you’re married, divorced, or widowed, and your spouse is or was eligible for Social Security. Spouses and ex-spouses generally are eligible for up to half of the spouse’s benefits. Widows and widowers can receive up to 100%.

You can claim benefits based on your own work history or on that of your spouse. You’ll automatically get the larger amount.

If you are no more than three months away from age 62, you can apply online or by phone. If you plan to put off applying to get the largest payment possible, wait until you’re no more than three months from full retirement age. That’s 65, 66 or 67, depending on your birth year.

Can I Collect Half of My Spouse’s Social Security at 62?

Not quite. The percentage of your spouse’s full retirement benefit that you receive could be as little as 32.5% at age 62. It steps up gradually to 50% as you near your full retirement age, which is 65, 66 or 67, depending on your birth year. And don’t bother delaying your spousal benefits past your full retirement age. The amount you receive won’t grow beyond that age.

What Is the Maximum Spousal Social Security Benefit?

The maximum spousal benefit is 50% of the amount that the spouse is eligible to receive at full retirement age.

If your spouse delays retiring until 70, the spouse gets more, but you don’t.

Survivors may receive up to 100% of the deceased spouse’s Social Security benefit.

How Can I Switch From My Social Security Benefit to a Spousal Benefit?

You can only switch from your benefit to a spousal benefit if your spouse has begun receiving retirement benefits and you are at least 62 years old (or are caring for a qualifying child). You can claim your benefit based on your work history until your spouse files, and then you can switch to the spousal benefit. However, if you’re not at your full retirement age, you’ll get paid a reduced spousal benefit, which can be as low as 32.5% of your spouse’s benefit amount.

To monitor your benefits or change them, you can create an account on the Social Security site. It allows you to make some changes online, although other changes require a phone call.

The Bottom Line

Maximizing your spousal Social Security benefits is all about the timing, and the timing is determined by your circumstances as a couple.

If both partners work, they should investigate what each partner’s individual benefit will be. Unless one partner earns massively more than the other, it will probably pay for both to file individually, waiting at least to full retirement age, and ideally to age 70, if possible.

Read the original article on Investopedia.