Updated September 4, 2026. Quick answer. The SIMPLE IRA elective-deferral limit for 2026 is not one number but six, depending on your employer’s size, your age, and whether your employer elected the SECURE 2.0 enhancement: the standard base deferral is $17,000; employers with 25 or fewer employees (or 26–100 that elect a richer match) get an enhanced base of $18,100. The standard age-50 catch-up is $4,000, but on the enhanced track it is a slightly different $3,850, a genuine quirk of the rounding math, not a typo. Savers turning 60–63 get a further enhanced catch-up of $5,250 on either track. None of the 2027 versions are announced yet, and no named forecaster (Milliman, Bloomberg Tax, or Thomson Reuters Checkpoint) has published SIMPLE projections.
What’s actually settled, vs. still open
Settled for 2026 (IRS Notice 2025-67): standard base deferral $17,000; enhanced small-employer base $18,100; standard age-50 catch-up $4,000; enhanced-track age-50 catch-up $3,850; SECURE 2.0 age-60–63 catch-up $5,250 on either track. Combined maximums: $22,250 on the standard track, $23,350 on the enhanced track for a saver 60–63.
Open: all six 2027 figures, governed by 26 U.S.C. §408(p)(2)(E). The age-60–63 enhanced catch-up and the ≤25-employee 110% enhancement are both SECURE 2.0 features that only began applying in 2025, so there is no pre-2025 history for those two lines specifically.
The numbers, year by year
| Year | Standard base | Age-50 catch-up |
|---|---|---|
| 2022 | $14,000 | $3,000 |
| 2023 | $15,500 | $3,500 |
| 2024 | $16,000 | $3,500 |
| 2025 | $16,500 | $3,500 |
| 2026 | $17,000 | $4,000 |
| 2027 | not yet announced | not yet announced |
Six different SIMPLE IRA numbers, one straightforward question: is the plan itself any good.
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The enhanced small-employer track
SECURE 2.0 lets employers with 25 or fewer employees (or 26–100 employees that elect to provide a 4% matching or 3% nonelective contribution) adopt a richer deferral limit, 110% of the standard figure. That is why the base moves from $17,000 to $18,100 (not a clean 110%, because each figure is independently rounded) rather than a single number applying everywhere. Ask your plan administrator which track your employer elected before assuming which figures apply to you.
Sources
2026 figures: IRS Notice 2025-67, cross-checked against Ed Slott's IRAHelp.com breakdown, “The Crazy Complicated 2026 SIMPLE IRA Plan Elective Deferral Limits,” both read 2026-09-04. Statute: 26 U.S.C. §408(p)(2)(E); the small-employer enhancement and age-60–63 catch-up were added by the SECURE 2.0 Act of 2022. No 2027 figures or forecaster projections were found as of this date.
This page is updated the day the official figure is announced, and any projection above will be struck through rather than deleted, so the record of what was projected vs. what actually happened stays visible. See the 2027 numbers hub for every figure this program tracks, projected vs. official. General information, not tax or legal advice.