When to Claim Social Security: 62 vs. 67 vs. 70 (2026)

Deciding when to claim Social Security is one of the biggest money decisions you'll ever make, and it lands hardest when a family is already paying for care. The claiming-age math is only half the story. The other half is what those numbers mean when a spouse is in memory care, a parent might need Medicaid, or you're a widow choosing which check to take first.

In This Guide

• When to Claim Social Security: 62 vs. 67 vs. 70
• What's Your Full Retirement Age?
• Claiming Early at 62
• Waiting Until 70
• When Claiming Early Is the Right Call
• The Medicaid Trap
• Benefits for Spouses and Ex-Spouses
• Survivor Benefits and the Switch
• Will Your Benefits Be Taxed?
• How and When to Claim Social Security
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Learn More

When to Claim Social Security: 62 vs. 67 vs. 70

The tradeoff is simple: the longer you wait to claim Social Security, up to age 70, the larger your monthly check, but the fewer years you'll collect it.

Claim at 62, the earliest age you can, and your benefit is reduced by about 30 percent for life.1 Wait past your full retirement age and it grows by about 8 percent for each year you delay, until it stops growing at 70.2 So the same worker's benefit runs from roughly 70 percent of the full amount at 62 to about 124 percent at 70. That spread is the whole decision.

The general advice you'll read is to wait as long as you can, and for a healthy person with other income, that's usually sound. But "as long as you can" is doing a lot of work in that sentence. For a family stretched by care costs, the right answer often looks different, and the reasons why are the rest of this guide.

What's Your Full Retirement Age?

Every figure above is measured from your full retirement age, the age at which you get 100 percent of your benefit. For anyone born in 1960 or later, that age is 67.3 People born between 1955 and 1959 reach it a few months earlier, on a sliding scale between 66 and 67.

Full retirement age matters because it's the pivot. Claim before it and your benefit is reduced. Claim after it and you earn credits. Knowing yours is the first thing to look up before you decide anything else.

Claiming Early at 62

If you claim at 62 with a full retirement age of 67, your monthly benefit is cut by about 30 percent, and that cut is permanent.1 It doesn't reset when you reach full retirement age. A benefit that would have been $2,000 at 67 becomes roughly $1,400 for the rest of your life.

That's the cost, stated plainly. It's a real cost, and it's why claiming early gets a bad reputation. But a smaller check you start collecting at 62 is not automatically worse than a larger one you start at 70, because you collect the smaller one for eight more years. Which one wins depends entirely on how long you live and what you need the money for now.

Waiting Until 70

Delaying past full retirement age earns you delayed retirement credits, worth about 8 percent a year for anyone born in 1943 or later.2 Wait the full three years from 67 to 70 and your benefit is about 24 percent larger, for life, with annual cost-of-living increases layered on top of the bigger base.

There's no bonus for waiting past 70, so 70 is the ceiling. The case for waiting is strongest if you're in good health, expect a long retirement, and have other income to live on in the meantime. The "break-even" age, where the larger delayed check catches up to the total you'd have collected by claiming earlier, usually falls in the late 70s or early 80s. Live past it and waiting pays off. That's a real bet on your own longevity, and it's a reasonable one for many people. It just isn't the right bet for everyone.

When Claiming Early Is the Right Call

Claiming early can be exactly the right call in several common situations:

• Your health is poor or your family history is short. If you don't expect to reach your break-even age, the larger delayed benefit never pays off. Taking the smaller check sooner means more total dollars in your pocket.
• You need the money now. If you've stopped working, savings are thin, and the bills are due, a check at 62 you can actually live on beats a bigger one at 70 you can't wait for. Claiming early to avoid draining retirement accounts or running up debt is a legitimate choice, not a mistake.
• You're funding a spouse's care. When one spouse is in assisted living or memory care, the household often needs income immediately. Sometimes the right move is for the lower earner to claim early for cash flow while the higher earner delays to lock in the largest possible benefit, which also becomes the survivor benefit later.

None of these is the "wait until 70" default. All of them are common in families dealing with care.

The Medicaid Trap

This interaction can quietly undo an otherwise smart claiming plan, and it catches families off guard.

Social Security is counted as income when Medicaid decides whether someone qualifies for long-term care, whether that's a nursing home or a home-based waiver. Medicaid for older adults counts income using the rules of the SSI program, and under those rules a Social Security check is countable income.4

In many states, a person applying for long-term-care Medicaid has to stay under a monthly income limit. A larger Social Security benefit raises your countable income. So the same delayed-retirement strategy that maximizes your check can push you or your spouse over the line that qualifies you for the coverage that actually pays for care, which can run several thousand dollars a month. Families discover this after the fact, when an application is denied over a benefit increase they were proud to have earned.

The fix usually exists, often a special kind of trust that holds the excess income, but it's another moving part, and it's the reason the claiming decision and the Medicaid question have to be answered together, not one after the other. If Medicaid is anywhere on your horizon, read how Medicaid income limits work by state before you lock in a claiming age, and talk to someone who does both kinds of planning.

Benefits for Spouses and Ex-Spouses

Social Security isn't only about your own work record. A spouse can claim a benefit of up to 50 percent of the higher earner's full benefit, based on that worker's record.5 The 50 percent is the maximum, paid if the spouse waits until their own full retirement age. Claim the spousal benefit at 62 instead and it drops to about 32.5 percent of the worker's benefit, permanently.1 You receive your own benefit or the spousal amount, whichever is higher, not both.

Divorced spouses have rights here too, and they're widely misunderstood. If your marriage lasted at least 10 years and you're currently unmarried, you can claim on an ex-spouse's record. If you've been divorced at least two years, you can claim even if your ex hasn't filed yet, as long as they're at least 62.6 Your claim doesn't reduce your ex's benefit or their current spouse's benefit by a penny. For an older divorced woman who spent years out of the workforce, this can be the difference between a tiny benefit and a livable one. Our full guide to Social Security spousal benefits covers the amounts, the deemed-filing rule that limits switching between benefits, and the divorced-spouse details.

Survivor Benefits and the Switch

When a spouse dies, the survivor can receive up to 100 percent of what the deceased was getting, if the survivor has reached their own full retirement age for survivors. Claim earlier, as early as 60, and the survivor benefit is reduced to about 71.5 percent, rising back toward 99 percent as you approach full retirement age.7

One rule flips the usual advice here: a survivor benefit does not earn delayed retirement credits. Waiting past your survivor full retirement age gains you nothing. So the smart move for a widow or widower is usually not to wait, but to sequence. You might claim the survivor benefit early while letting your own retirement benefit keep growing to 70, then switch to your own larger check. Or the reverse. Which sequence wins depends on whose benefit was bigger, but the strategy of taking one benefit now and switching to the other at its peak can add up to tens of thousands of dollars over a retirement. Our full guide to Social Security survivor benefits walks through the reduction schedule and the switch strategy in detail.

Will Your Benefits Be Taxed?

Many people are surprised to learn their Social Security is taxed at all. Up to 85 percent of your benefits can be subject to federal income tax, though only once your income passes a threshold that depends on your filing status.8 Below that threshold, none of it is taxed. Our guide to whether Social Security is taxable walks through the combined-income formula, the thresholds, and the 2025 senior tax break.

One thing worth knowing: those income thresholds are fixed in the law and don't rise with inflation, so a little more of each year's retirees gets pulled into paying tax on benefits over time. State taxes are separate, and they vary widely by state. How your state treats retirement income is covered in our guide to retirement income tax by state.

How and When to Claim Social Security

You apply through the Social Security Administration, online at ssa.gov, by phone, or at a local office, and you can file ahead of when you want benefits to begin. One timing note trips people up more than any other: signing up for Medicare is a separate step tied to age 65, not to when you claim Social Security. If you claim Social Security before 65, Medicare enrollment is usually automatic. If you delay Social Security, you have to enroll in Medicare yourself, and missing that window carries its own lifelong penalties.9,10

If you plan to keep working while collecting benefits before your full retirement age, know how the annual earnings test works: Social Security withholds $1 of benefit for every $2 you earn above an annual limit ($24,480 in 2026), and once you reach full retirement age the limit disappears and nothing is withheld. What's held back isn't lost, either. At full retirement age Social Security recalculates your benefit to credit the months it withheld, so working early delays some of the benefit rather than forfeiting it.11

If any of this feels like more than you should have to sort out while also arranging care for someone you love, that's a fair reaction. It's a lot, and the pieces genuinely interact.

Learn More

Find personalized help deciding when to claim Social Security around your family's care costs at brevy.com.

The information on Brevy.com is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional legal, financial, or medical advice. Rules vary by state and program and change frequently. Always verify with the relevant agency or a qualified professional. Brevy is not a law firm, financial advisor, or healthcare provider.