Maskot | Digitalvision | Getty Images<\/p>\n
The IRS has announced new\u00a0401(k)<\/a> contribution limits\u00a0for 2026.<\/p>\n In its release<\/a> Thursday, the agency increased the employee deferral limit to $24,500 next year, up from $23,500 in 2025. The change applies to 401(k)s, 403(b)s and most 457 plans, along with the federal Thrift Savings Plan.\u00a0<\/p>\n The IRS also unveiled 2026 catch-up contribution limits<\/a> for savers age 50 and older, new individual retirement account savings limits<\/a> and higher income thresholds for Roth IRA contributions<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Starting in 2026, the 401(k) catch-up contribution limit will rise to $8,000 for savers 50 and older, from $7,500 in 2025. But investors aged 60 to 63 can instead save an extra $11,250, based on changes enacted via Secure 2.0<\/a>. That figure is unchanged from 2025.<\/p>\n Both amounts are in addition to the $24,500 deferral limit for 2026.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Read more CNBC personal finance coverage<\/p>\n In 2024, <\/strong>only 14% of participants maxed out their 401(k)s<\/a>, according to Vanguard’s 2025 How America Saves report, which was based on more than 1,400 qualified plans and nearly 5 million participants. The average combined savings rate<\/a>, including employer deposits, was an estimated 12%, according to the same report.\u00a0<\/p>\n A separate report found the average 401(k) savings rate, including employee and employer contributions, was a combined 14.2%<\/a> during the second quarter of 2025, according to a Fidelity Investments analysis of more than 25,000 corporate plans and 24.6 million participants.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n The IRS announcement comes hours after President Donald Trump<\/a> signed into law<\/a> a funding bill to end the longest federal government shutdown in U.S. history. It also comes roughly a month <\/strong>after the agency released dozens of inflation adjustments for 2026, including federal income tax brackets<\/a>, higher capital gains brackets<\/a> and provisions impacting families<\/a>, among others.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Maskot | Digitalvision | Getty Images The IRS has announced new\u00a0401(k) contribution limits\u00a0for 2026. In its release Thursday,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":179013,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[177],"tags":[9,3055,5490,79,207,6619,356,18,3260,3596,17510,19,79408,17,17508,234,7807,235,2895,17509,11388],"class_list":{"0":"post-179012","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breaking-news-investing","10":"tag-breaking-news-politics","11":"tag-business","12":"tag-business-news","13":"tag-donald-j-trump","14":"tag-donald-trump","15":"tag-eire","16":"tag-estate-planning","17":"tag-financial-planning","18":"tag-government-taxation-and-revenue","19":"tag-ie","20":"tag-internal-revenue-service","21":"tag-ireland","22":"tag-national-taxes","23":"tag-personal-finance","24":"tag-personal-saving","25":"tag-personalfinance","26":"tag-retirement-planning","27":"tag-tax-planning","28":"tag-taxes"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115544091720976320","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179012","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179012"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179012\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/179013"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179012"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179012"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179012"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n