You can start Social Security retirement benefits any month between age 62 and age 70, and the age you pick changes the size of your check for the rest of your life. There is no single right answer -- but there is a clear framework for thinking it through.
The Three Claiming Ages
Social Security gives you a window, not a deadline. Three ages anchor that window.
- Age 62 -- the earliest: You can claim as early as 62, but your benefit is permanently reduced for every month you claim before your full retirement age. For someone whose full retirement age is 67, claiming at 62 cuts the monthly check by roughly 30 percent -- and that reduction does not go away later.
- Full retirement age (FRA): This is the age at which you receive 100 percent of the benefit your earnings record has earned. For everyone born in 1960 or later, full retirement age is 67. If you were born between 1955 and 1959, it falls between 66 and 67 -- 66 plus a certain number of months, depending on your birth year.
- Age 70 -- the latest that matters: For every year you wait past full retirement age, your benefit grows by 8 percent through delayed retirement credits. Those credits stop accruing at 70, so there is no financial benefit to waiting past that age. If you have not claimed by 70, claim.
The Break-Even Intuition
Claiming early means smaller checks for a longer time. Claiming late means bigger checks for a shorter time. If you live a long life, the larger delayed benefit eventually overtakes the head start from claiming early -- and keeps paying more every month thereafter. If your health or family history points toward a shorter retirement, taking benefits earlier can be the sensible move.
You will see precise break-even ages quoted online. Treat them as rough guides, not answers. The real decision turns on things a calculator cannot know: your health, whether you are still working, whether you have other income to live on while you wait, and -- often most important -- whether a spouse will someday depend on your benefit as a survivor. Because a surviving spouse generally steps into the larger of the two benefits, delaying the higher earner's claim is frequently the most valuable form of longevity insurance a married couple can buy.
Working While Collecting: The Earnings Test
If you claim before full retirement age and keep working, the retirement earnings test can temporarily withhold part of your benefit. These limits change every year; the 2026 figures are below, and the current ones are always at ssa.gov.
- Under FRA all year (2026): You can earn up to $24,480 for the year with no reduction. Above that, Social Security withholds $1 in benefits for every $2 you earn over the limit.
- The year you reach FRA (2026): A gentler test applies: the limit rises to $65,160, counting only earnings in the months before you reach full retirement age, and the withholding is $1 for every $3 over.
- From FRA on: There is no earnings test. You can earn any amount with no reduction in benefits.
Here is the part people miss: withheld benefits are not lost. When you reach full retirement age, Social Security recalculates your benefit and credits back the months that were withheld, raising your check going forward. The earnings test is a deferral, not a penalty -- though it still matters for cash flow if you were counting on those checks.
What Is Current in 2026
A few figures and one major law change are worth knowing this year. All dollar amounts below are 2026 figures and adjust annually -- check ssa.gov for the latest.
- Cost-of-living adjustment: Benefits rose 2.8 percent for 2026. The COLA applies whether or not you have claimed yet.
- Taxable wage base: Earnings up to $184,500 are subject to Social Security tax in 2026 -- and only earnings up to that cap count toward your future benefit.
- Maximum benefit at FRA: A worker claiming at full retirement age in 2026 can receive at most $4,152 per month. Claiming at 70 pushes the maximum higher; claiming at 62 pulls it lower.
- WEP and GPO are repealed: The Social Security Fairness Act, signed in January 2025, eliminated the Windfall Elimination Provision and the Government Pension Offset. Teachers, firefighters, police officers, and other public-sector retirees with pensions from non-covered work no longer lose Social Security benefits to those offsets. If you avoided claiming in the past because of WEP or GPO, that math has changed -- it is worth a fresh look.
Yes, Your Benefits Can Still Be Taxed
A widespread misconception is worth correcting directly: the 2025 tax law (often called OBBBA) did not end federal income tax on Social Security benefits. The long-standing provisional-income rules still apply. If your combined income exceeds $25,000 (single) or $32,000 (married filing jointly), a portion of your benefits becomes taxable -- up to 85 percent of them at higher income levels. Those thresholds are set in law and do not adjust for inflation.
What the law actually did was create a separate deduction of $6,000 per person for taxpayers age 65 and older, available for tax years 2025 through 2028. It phases out for modified adjusted gross income above $75,000 (single) or $150,000 (joint). For many retirees this deduction reduces or wipes out the tax owed on their benefits -- but it is a deduction against income generally, not a repeal of benefit taxation, and it is scheduled to expire.
Spousal and Survivor Basics
Your claiming decision often is not yours alone. A spouse can receive a spousal benefit of up to 50 percent of your primary insurance amount -- the benefit you earned at your full retirement age. The spouse gets the full 50 percent only by waiting until his or her own full retirement age to claim; claiming spousal benefits earlier reduces them permanently, just as it does a worker's own benefit. Spousal benefits do not grow past full retirement age, so there is no reason for a spouse to delay a spousal claim beyond that point.
Survivor benefits follow different rules. A widow or widower can claim survivor benefits as early as age 60 (earlier in cases of disability or when caring for the deceased worker's young or disabled child), though claiming before the survivor's own full retirement age reduces the amount. Because the survivor generally receives the larger of the two checks in a marriage, the higher earner's decision to delay does double duty: it raises that worker's own benefit and it raises what the surviving spouse will live on later.
Where to Go From Here
The single most useful step is to open a my Social Security account at ssa.gov. It shows your actual earnings record and personalized benefit estimates at 62, full retirement age, and 70 -- real numbers for your situation, not averages. Check that your earnings history is accurate while you are there, since your benefit is calculated from your 35 highest-earning years.
And if you want to think through how a claiming age interacts with your work plans, your spouse's benefit, or your tax picture, ask Jaya on WithDave. She can walk through the trade-offs for your specific situation, in plain English, before you make a decision you will live with for decades.