When Should You Claim Social Security? 62 vs. 67 vs. 70 (2026)

Your brother-in-law took it at 62 and says you're crazy to wait. Somebody on the radio says wait until 70, no exceptions. You're 63, you've got a number in your head, and you have no idea who's right.

Here's the honest version. If you were born in 1960 or later, claiming at 62 pays 70% of your full benefit, claiming at 67 pays 100%, and claiming at 70 pays 124%. Those percentages are permanent. Everything else in this decision — your health, your job, your spouse, your savings — is about which of those three numbers you should be aiming at.

A quick word on who we are before we get into it: TSM Life & Health is an independent insurance and retirement advisory in Milford, Connecticut. We are not the Social Security Administration, and we're not connected with or endorsed by any government agency. There is nothing to sell you here — nobody sells Social Security. What follows is the arithmetic and the trade-offs, with every figure sourced, so you can check our work. For how claiming timing fits with the rest of a retirement plan, see our Social Security planning page.

The short answer, in percentages

Social Security starts with one number: your primary insurance amount, or PIA. That's the monthly benefit you'd receive if you started at exactly your full retirement age. It's built from your highest-earning 35 years, indexed for wage growth, run through a weighted formula. You can see yours in a free my Social Security account at ssa.gov.

Every claiming age is just a percentage of that one number. Here's the whole table, straight from the SSA actuaries:

Source: SSA Office of the Chief Actuary, "Early or delayed retirement" (benefit as a percentage of PIA). Accessed 2026-08-17. Anyone born on January 1 of a year should use the previous birth year.

Read the bottom row. For everyone born in 1960 or later — which is most people making this decision now and everyone making it from here on — the spread between the earliest and latest claiming age is 70% versus 124%. That's a monthly check 77% larger for waiting eight years.

What is your full retirement age?

Every percentage above is measured against your full retirement age, so that's the first thing to pin down. It is not 65, and it has not been 65 for a long time. It steps up two months per birth year and lands at 67.

Source: SSA Benefits Planner, "Retirement Age and Benefit Reduction". Accessed 2026-08-17. If you were born on the 1st of a month, SSA figures your benefit as if your birthday were the previous month.

What each year early or late is actually worth

Two different formulas run on either side of full retirement age, and knowing them explains why the early years hurt more than the later ones help in the first stretch.

Before full retirement age, your benefit is cut by 5/9 of one percent for each of the first 36 months you're early, and by 5/12 of one percent for every month beyond that. Someone born in 1960 or later claiming at 62 is 60 months early: 36 months at 5/9 of 1% plus 24 months at 5/12 of 1% comes to exactly the 30% reduction SSA publishes.

After full retirement age, you earn delayed retirement credits of 8% per year — two-thirds of one percent per month — for anyone born in 1943 or later. The credits stop the month you turn 70. Waiting past 70 earns you nothing, which is why nobody should ever wait past 70.

Percentages are abstract. Here's what they look like in dollars, at three illustrative benefit levels.

TSM calculation applying the SSA percentages for people born in 1960 or later to three round, illustrative full-benefit amounts. Percentages from SSA, Early or delayed retirement (accessed 2026-08-17). Figures exclude cost-of-living adjustments, taxes and Medicare premium deductions. These are not quotes or estimates of your own benefit — get that from ssa.gov.

At a $2,000 full benefit, the difference between the earliest and latest claim is $1,080 a month — about $12,960 a year, before any cost-of-living adjustment compounds on top of it. That is the real size of this decision.

The same pattern shows up in SSA's own published example of a worker with maximum taxable earnings every year since age 22. These are actual 2026 dollars, not percentages:

When does waiting pay off? The break-even ages

Claiming early means smaller checks starting sooner. Waiting means bigger checks starting later. At some age the totals cross. That crossing point is the break-even age, and it's the single most useful number in this whole decision.

Here's the part almost nobody tells you: the break-even ages are the same for everybody with the same full retirement age. They come out of the percentages, not the dollars, so the arithmetic is identical whether your full benefit is $1,200 or $4,000.

TSM calculation. Method: cumulative benefits paid from each start age, using the SSA percentages of the primary insurance amount for people born in 1960 or later (SSA, Early or delayed retirement, accessed 2026-08-17). Excludes cost-of-living adjustments, income taxes, the earnings test and any return on money received earlier. Because the comparison is percentage-to-percentage, the crossover ages do not vary with benefit size.

Two honest caveats about break-even math, because it gets oversold in both directions.

First, it ignores what you could do with the money you receive earlier. If you invest early benefits rather than spend them, the crossover moves later. Most people claiming at 62 are spending the money, not investing it, so the plain version above is usually the more realistic one — but it's an assumption, and you should know you're making it.

Second, break-even treats this as a bet on longevity. It isn't only that. A larger benefit is also insurance against living a long time — the one risk you can't diversify away. Social Security is inflation-adjusted, lasts as long as you do, and doesn't care what the market did. Buying more of it by waiting is closer to buying protection than to placing a wager.

How long would you have to live?

Break-even ages in the high 70s and low 80s only mean something next to a life expectancy. Here is what SSA's actuaries publish — and note this is life expectancy from the age you've already reached, which is always longer than life expectancy at birth.

Source: SSA Office of the Chief Actuary, Actuarial Life Table — 2023 period life table for the Social Security area population, as used in the 2026 Trustees Report. Accessed 2026-08-17. These are population averages, not a prediction about you.

Put the two tables side by side. A 62-year-old man averages another 20.3 years, which lands at about 82.3 — past the 78-and-8-months crossover for waiting to 67, and past the 80-and-4-months crossover for waiting to 70. A 62-year-old woman averages 23.1 more years, to about 85.1, which clears every break-even in the table.

That's the statistical case for patience. It is also exactly where averages stop being useful. Half of people don't reach the average. If you have a serious health condition, or a family history that has been unkind, the average is not your number and you should not plan as though it is.

What does everyone else do?

Worth knowing, if only so you can see how much the crowd behavior differs from the math. Here is when people actually started their retirement benefits in 2024.

Source: SSA Annual Statistical Supplement, 2025, Table 6.B5.1, year of entitlement 2024. Accessed 2026-08-17. The 66 row combines SSA's three published sub-columns for that age (before, at, and after full retirement age).

Age 62 is still the single most common starting age, and fewer than one in ten people wait to 70. There is one more number from the same SSA source that is worth sitting with. Among retired-worker awards in 2024, those that carried a reduction for early retirement averaged $1,620.17 a month. Those with no reduction averaged $2,481.10. That gap reflects earnings histories as well as claiming timing — people who can afford to wait usually earned more — but it is a real, published difference of about $861 a month between the two groups.

The most common claiming age is not the same thing as the right claiming age. It's mostly a record of who could afford to wait.

When claiming early tends to fit

Claiming at 62 is not a mistake. It's a trade, and for a lot of people it's the right trade. It tends to fit when:

• Your health or family history points to a shorter life expectancy. If the break-even ages are past where you realistically expect to be, taking the money sooner is the better deal, and it isn't close.
• You need the income now and there's no other source. Draining a 401(k) at a punishing rate from 62 to 70 to protect a bigger check later can leave you worse off both ways. Cash flow beats theory.
• You're the lower earner in a married couple. The lower benefit usually disappears at the first death anyway, since the survivor keeps only the larger check. Squeezing every dollar out of it by waiting matters less than it does for the higher earner.
• You've stopped working and you're under 62 in a gap year. Bringing income in early can reduce how hard you draw down savings during a market drop, which is a real risk in the first years of retirement.
• You're caring for a young or disabled child who could receive benefits on your record once you file.

What claiming early is not a good reason for: a rumor that the program is about to disappear, a feeling that you should "get yours" before someone else does, or the fact that a neighbor did it. Those are the three reasons we hear most, and none of them survive contact with your own numbers.

If you'd rather not sort this out on your own, we can walk through it together — no cost, no obligation. Free Consultation

When waiting tends to fit

• You're the higher earner in a married couple. This is the strongest case in the whole article, and it gets its own section below.
• You're in good health with long-lived parents. The longer you're likely to live, the more the 124% version is worth.
• You're still working and under full retirement age. The earnings test may withhold much of the benefit anyway, so claiming buys you a permanent reduction in exchange for checks you don't actually receive.
• You have savings, a pension, or guaranteed income that can bridge the gap. Waiting is only available to people who can pay for the waiting years.
• You're worried about outliving your money. A bigger inflation-adjusted lifetime check is the cleanest hedge against a long life there is.
• You want to manage taxable income before required withdrawals start. Some households use the pre-claiming years for Roth conversions. Coordinate that with a tax professional, and know it can affect Medicare premiums two years later.

General patterns for discussion, not a recommendation. Your own answer depends on figures only you and SSA have. Source framing based on SSA Benefits Planner, "Before You Make Your Decision". Accessed 2026-08-17.

The question married couples forget

Most claiming conversations treat it as one person's decision about one person's money. For a married couple that framing is wrong, and getting it wrong is expensive.

When one spouse dies, the survivor doesn't keep both checks. They keep the larger of the two. So the higher earner's claiming decision doesn't just set their own income — it sets the floor the surviving spouse lives on, potentially for decades.

Run it through. A husband with a $3,000 full benefit claims at 62 and locks in $2,100. He dies at 79. His wife, whose own benefit is smaller, steps up to $2,100 for the rest of her life. Had he waited to 70, the same household would have had $3,720 while he was alive, and she would be living on $3,720 afterward instead of $2,100. Same man, same earnings record, same death date — a difference of $1,620 a month for the surviving spouse, indefinitely.

Look back at the life-expectancy table and you'll see why this lands so hard. Women reaching 65 average about 2.6 more years than men reaching 65, and wives are often younger than their husbands to begin with. The survivor period is frequently a long one.

One more piece that belongs in the same conversation: for some households, a modest life insurance policy does the same job as delaying — it replaces income the survivor would lose. The right answer is whichever one your household can actually afford and qualify for. Often it's a bit of both.

What if you're still working?

Claiming before full retirement age while you're still earning wages runs into the retirement earnings test, and it catches people off guard every year.

For 2026, SSA withholds $1 of benefits for every $2 you earn above $24,480 if you're under full retirement age for the whole year. In the year you actually reach full retirement age, the rule loosens to $1 withheld for every $3 above $65,160, counting only the months before you hit full retirement age. Starting the month you reach full retirement age, there is no limit at all.

Two things people get wrong about this. The withheld money is not confiscated — at full retirement age your benefit is recalculated upward to credit the months that were withheld. And the test counts wages and self-employment income only, not pensions, investment income or IRA withdrawals. The full mechanics, including how the recalculation works, are in our post on the Social Security earnings test in 2026.

The practical upshot: if you're 63, working, and earning well above the limit, claiming now often means accepting a permanent reduction in exchange for checks that are largely withheld anyway. That's usually the worst of both.

Medicare, taxes and the ripple effects

Claiming Social Security doesn't happen in isolation. Three connections are worth knowing before you file.

Medicare at 65 is a separate decision

You do not have to claim Social Security to get Medicare, and you should not delay Medicare just because you're delaying Social Security. SSA's own guidance is explicit: if you delay benefits past 65, still apply for Medicare within three months of your 65th birthday, because delaying Part B or Part D coverage can cost you more later.

If you are already receiving Social Security at 65, enrollment in Parts A and B is generally automatic and the Part B premium comes straight out of your monthly check. The standard Part B premium is $202.90 a month for 2026, with an annual Part B deductible of $283 (CMS, released November 14, 2025). If you're not yet receiving benefits, you enroll yourself and Medicare bills you directly. Our guide to Medicare enrollment periods and deadlines walks through the windows, and our Medicare page covers how the parts fit together.

More Social Security can mean more tax

Depending on your other income, a portion of your Social Security benefit can be federally taxable. The lever isn't the benefit — it's the other income, which means withdrawal sequencing and the timing of capital gains and Roth conversions matter. We cover the thresholds and the arithmetic in how Social Security is taxed. Connecticut has its own rules and exempts Social Security for many residents below certain income levels.

Big income years show up in your Medicare premium two years later

Higher-income households pay an income-related surcharge on Part B and Part D premiums, and it's based on the tax return from two years earlier. A Roth conversion at 65 can raise your Medicare premium at 67. It's a cliff, not a ramp — one dollar over a bracket line moves you to the next tier. See how IRMAA works and how to appeal it before you make a large one-time withdrawal.

Two Connecticut examples, before and after

Both examples below are composites created to illustrate the arithmetic. They are not real clients, and the dollar figures are illustrative applications of the SSA percentages, not quotes.

Diane in Milford: the case for not waiting

Before. Diane is 62, divorced, and was laid off at 61. Her full retirement benefit would be $1,800. She has about $90,000 in a 401(k), a paid-off condo, and a manageable but real heart condition. She'd been told by a co-worker that waiting to 70 is "always" the right answer, and she was planning to burn through most of the 401(k) getting there.

After. Run the numbers and waiting doesn't hold up for her. Claiming at 62 gives her $1,260 a month. Waiting to 70 would give her $2,232 — but the crossover doesn't arrive until about age 80 and 4 months, and getting there means spending nearly all of her savings, leaving nothing for a bad year. She claims at 62, keeps the 401(k) intact as an emergency reserve, and picks up part-time work under the earnings-test limit. The bigger check was never worth what it would have cost her to buy.

The Nowaks in Fairfield County: the case for splitting the difference

Before. Ted is 64 with a $3,200 full benefit; Ann is 62 with a $1,300 full benefit. Ted planned to file right away because he'd "paid in the longest." Ann assumed she had to file when he did.

After. Two changes. Ann files at 62 for $910 a month, bringing income into the house now — her benefit is the one that disappears at the first death anyway. Ted waits. At 70 his check is $3,968 instead of the $2,880 he'd have locked in at 64. While both are alive the household is ahead by roughly $1,088 a month once he files. And if Ted goes first, Ann steps up to $3,968 rather than $2,880 — a difference of about $1,088 a month for the rest of her life. They cover the gap years with Ann's benefit, Ted's part-time consulting, and a modest withdrawal schedule.

Same program, same rules, opposite conclusions. That's the whole point.

How to make this decision yourself

You do not need us to do this. Here's the sequence, and it's genuinely all of it.

1. Get your real numbers. Open a free my Social Security account at ssa.gov and pull your benefit estimate at 62, at full retirement age, and at 70. Everything else is guessing until you have these.
2. Check your earnings record while you're there. Your benefit is built from your highest 35 years. A missing or wrong year lowers it permanently, and errors are easier to fix now than later. If you have fewer than 35 years of earnings, the zeros are dragging your average down — another year of work may be worth more than you think.
3. Confirm your full retirement age from the birth-year table above. Not 65. Not "about 66."
4. Compare against the break-even ages in this article and be honest about your health. If you expect to live past your early 80s, the math favors waiting. If you don't, it doesn't.
5. If you're married, run the survivor question. Ask specifically: if the higher earner dies first, what does the survivor live on? Then ask what waiting would change about that number.
6. Fit it to the rest of the plan. Where does income come from in the waiting years? What does claiming do to your taxes? Does a big withdrawal now raise your Medicare premium in two years? Write it down.

Two limited do-overs, if you already claimed

Most of this decision is permanent, but not all of it.

Withdraw the application within 12 months. You can cancel your application up to 12 months after your benefits are approved by filing Form SSA-521. The catch is real: you have to repay everything you and your family received, including money withheld for Medicare premiums, taxes and garnishments, plus any Medicare Part A expenses paid during that time. You can only do this once, and you can reapply later.

Suspend at full retirement age. If you've reached full retirement age and are not yet 70, you can ask SSA to suspend your payments. Every suspended month earns delayed retirement credits, and payments restart automatically at 70. Two things to know: anyone drawing benefits on your record (other than a divorced spouse) also stops during the suspension, and CMS will bill you directly for Part B because the premium can't come out of a suspended check.

Neither is a clean reset, but if you filed in a panic or before you understood the survivor math, one of them may still be open to you.

The 2026 figures worth writing down

Sources: SSA, 2026 Cost-of-Living Adjustment Fact Sheet (COLA, average and maximum benefits, earnings-test amounts, wage base); CMS, 2026 Medicare Parts A & B Premiums and Deductibles, released November 14, 2025 (Part B premium). Both accessed 2026-08-17.

Where an advisor fits

Nobody sells Social Security, so there's no commission in this conversation. What an independent advisor adds is the part that's hard to do alone: putting the claiming decision next to your Medicare timing, your taxes, your savings withdrawal order, and — if you're married — your spouse's record, and looking at all of it at once.

That's what we do at TSM. We map 62 versus full retirement age versus 70 against your actual earnings record from ssa.gov, run the couple's order of claiming, and coordinate it with Medicare and any pension or guaranteed income. It's free, and a fair number of those conversations end with us telling someone their original plan was fine. You can see how we work, and we're licensed in eight states — the full list is on our areas we serve page.

Frequently asked questions

Written by

Keith McLiverty

Keith is the Founder & COO of TSM Life & Health, with more than 30 years in finance, taxes, medical insurance and retirement planning. He started TSM after watching his own parents try to sort out Social Security, Medicare and insurance with nobody in their corner. He believes in educating first and planning second. This article is general education, not individualized insurance, tax, or Social Security advice. TSM Life & Health is an independent agency and is not affiliated with or endorsed by the Social Security Administration or any government agency.

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