Yes, you can get Social Security if you have never worked. The benefit will come through someone else’s earnings record — a current spouse, an ex-spouse, a deceased spouse, or a parent — or through Supplemental Security Income, a separate program for people who are aged, blind, or disabled with very limited income. Which door you walk through depends on your relationship to a worker who paid into the system, your age, and in the case of SSI, your finances.
Social Security retirement and disability benefits normally require 40 work credits, about ten years of earnings.1Social Security Administration. Social Security Credits With zero credits of your own, you cannot claim on your own record. The paths below do not require any credits from you.
Benefits On A Living Spouse’s Record
If your spouse qualifies for Social Security retirement or disability benefits, you can collect on their record. You need to have been married at least one year and be either 62 or older, or any age if you are caring for your spouse’s child who is 15 or younger or has a disability.2Social Security Administration. Who Can Get Family Benefits
At your full retirement age, the spousal benefit pays up to 50 percent of your spouse’s primary insurance amount. Filing earlier cuts the check permanently. Claim at 62 and it can drop to as little as 32.5 percent of your spouse’s amount.3Social Security Administration. Benefits for Spouses Waiting until full retirement age gets you the full 50 percent.
Benefits On An Ex-Spouse’s Record
A divorced person can claim on a former spouse’s record if the marriage lasted at least ten years. You must be 62 or older, currently unmarried, and your ex must be eligible for retirement or disability benefits.2Social Security Administration. Who Can Get Family Benefits The 50-percent-at-full-retirement-age formula is the same, with the same reductions for claiming early.
Filing does not reduce your ex-spouse’s benefit or affect their current family. Your ex does not need to know you filed.4Social Security Administration. More Info: If You Had A Prior Marriage
Benefits On A Deceased Spouse’s Record
Survivor benefits pay more than spousal benefits. A surviving spouse qualifies at 60 or older, or at 50 if disabled. Age does not matter if you are caring for the deceased worker’s child who is younger than 16 or has a disability. You generally must have been married at least nine months before the death, and you must not have remarried before age 60 (or 50 if disabled).5Social Security Administration. Who Can Get Survivor Benefits
At full retirement age for survivors, which falls between 66 and 67 depending on your birth year, you receive 100 percent of the worker’s benefit. Claim at 60 and the payment drops to about 71.5 percent, rising the longer you wait.6Social Security Administration. What You Could Get From Survivor Benefits A surviving spouse caring for the worker’s young child gets 75 percent regardless of their own age.7Social Security Administration. Survivors Benefits
Divorced surviving spouses qualify under the same rules if the marriage lasted at least ten years.
Benefits On A Parent’s Record
A person who has never worked can also collect as a child on a parent’s earnings record. The child must be unmarried and either 17 or younger, between 18 and 19 and a full-time elementary or secondary student, or any age with a disability that began at 21 or younger.2Social Security Administration. Who Can Get Family Benefits The rule applies whether the parent is living and receiving benefits or has died.8Social Security Administration. Benefits for Children 2025 Adult children with a qualifying childhood-onset disability can draw this benefit indefinitely.
How Much The Family Can Collect Together
When more than one family member draws on the same worker’s record, total payments are capped. The family maximum generally lands between 150 and 180 percent of the worker’s primary insurance amount for retirement and survivor cases.9Social Security Administration. Formula for Family Maximum Benefit If the family’s combined dependent benefits exceed the cap, each dependent’s check is trimmed proportionally. The worker’s own benefit is untouched. Divorced spousal benefits are paid outside the cap, so an ex-spouse’s claim does not squeeze what the current family receives.
How Remarriage Can End The Benefit
This is where people most often lose a benefit they would otherwise have. If you are collecting on an ex-spouse’s record and you remarry, those payments stop.10Social Security Administration. Will Remarrying Affect My Social Security Benefits For survivor benefits, remarriage before age 60 (or 50 if disabled) generally makes you ineligible; if that later marriage ends, eligibility can be restored. Remarrying at 60 or later does not block survivor benefits, and at 62 you can switch to your new spouse’s record if that payment would be higher.7Social Security Administration. Survivors Benefits
Supplemental Security Income
SSI is a separate program with no connection to anyone’s work history. It is funded by general tax revenue, not payroll taxes, and it provides a floor of income for people who are aged, blind, or disabled with very few resources. The Social Security Administration runs it, which is why the two programs are often confused.
Who Qualifies
You must be 65 or older, blind, or have a disability that will affect your ability to work for at least a year or is expected to result in death. Adults under 65 without a disability do not qualify no matter how little income they have. You must also be a U.S. citizen or meet specific non-citizen eligibility criteria.11Social Security Administration. Who Can Get SSI
The resource test is strict. Countable resources cannot exceed $2,000 for an individual or $3,000 for a couple.12Social Security Administration. Understanding Supplemental Security Income SSI Resources — 2025 Edition Cash, bank accounts, and investments count. Your home and one vehicle do not. These limits have not been updated in decades.
How Much SSI Pays
The maximum federal SSI payment in 2026 is $994 per month for an individual and $1,491 for a couple.13Social Security Administration. SSI Federal Payment Amounts for 2026 Most states add a supplement on top; the size varies, and some states run their own supplement while others let the SSA administer it.14Social Security Administration. Understanding Supplemental Security Income SSI Benefits
Other income typically reduces your SSI dollar for dollar after certain exclusions. Living arrangements matter too. If someone else pays your shelter costs, the SSA may reduce your payment by applying a “presumed maximum value” for that support, which in 2026 is $351.33 per month for an individual living in someone else’s household.15Social Security Administration. POMS: SI 00835.901 – Values for In-Kind Support and Maintenance Since late 2024, food provided to you no longer counts, so a friend or relative buying your groceries will not shrink your check.
Are These Benefits Taxable
SSI is never taxable. Spousal, divorced spousal, survivor, and child benefits paid from someone else’s Social Security record are treated the same as any other Social Security income for tax purposes.
Whether you owe tax depends on your combined income: adjusted gross income, plus nontaxable interest, plus half of your Social Security benefits. Below $25,000 for a single filer or $32,000 for a couple filing jointly, none of the benefits are taxed. Between $25,000 and $34,000 (single) or $32,000 and $44,000 (joint), up to 50 percent becomes taxable. Above those upper figures, up to 85 percent is taxable.16Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 86 – Social Security and Tier 1 Railroad Retirement Benefits These thresholds have not been adjusted for inflation since they were set.
How To Apply
You can apply for most Social Security benefits online at ssa.gov, by calling the SSA’s toll-free number, or in person at a local office. SSI applications generally cannot be completed entirely online and require a phone call or office visit.
For spousal or survivor benefits, expect to provide your birth certificate (or other proof of birth), proof of your marriage or divorce, and proof of citizenship or lawful immigration status if you were not born in the United States. Photocopies of tax documents like W-2s are accepted, but originals are required for most other documents such as birth certificates.17Social Security Administration. Form SSA-1 – Information You Need To Apply For Retirement Benefits Or Medicare Do not mail original foreign birth records or immigration documents. Bring them to a Social Security office so they can be examined and returned to you.