You qualify for a Roth IRA if you have earned income and your modified adjusted gross income (MAGI) falls below the IRS threshold for your filing status. For 2026, single filers can make a full contribution with a MAGI under $153,000, and married couples filing jointly can contribute the full amount with a MAGI under $242,000.1Internal Revenue Service. 401(k) Limit Increases to $24,500 for 2026, IRA Limit Increases to $7,500 There is no age cap: anyone with qualifying income who meets the MAGI test can contribute.
The Earned Income Test
You need taxable compensation for the year you want to contribute. The IRS counts wages, salaries, tips, bonuses, commissions, self-employment income, nontaxable combat pay, and military differential pay. Taxable alimony under a divorce agreement finalized on or before December 31, 2018, also qualifies, as do taxable fellowship and stipend payments for graduate students.2Internal Revenue Service. Publication 590-A (2025), Contributions to Individual Retirement Arrangements
Several common income types do not qualify. Interest, dividends, rental income, pension or annuity payments, and deferred compensation are all excluded. Capital gains from selling investments don’t count either. If your only income comes from these passive sources, you cannot contribute to a Roth IRA no matter how much you earn overall.2Internal Revenue Service. Publication 590-A (2025), Contributions to Individual Retirement Arrangements
If you’re self-employed, your qualifying income is your net self-employment earnings after subtracting business expenses and the deductible half of self-employment tax.
A Non-Working Spouse Can Still Contribute
On a joint return, a non-working spouse can fund their own Roth IRA based on the working spouse’s earned income. Each spouse can contribute up to the annual limit, so long as the couple’s combined contributions don’t exceed the total taxable compensation on the joint return.3Internal Revenue Service. Retirement Topics – IRA Contribution Limits A household where one spouse earns $100,000 and the other earns nothing can still fund two Roth IRAs.
No Age Limit
Since 2020, there is no upper age limit for Roth IRA contributions. As long as you have earned income and meet the MAGI test, you can keep contributing well into your 70s, 80s, or beyond.3Internal Revenue Service. Retirement Topics – IRA Contribution Limits
2026 Income Limits by Filing Status
Even with qualifying compensation, your ability to contribute depends on your MAGI. The IRS sets phase-out ranges that reduce and eventually eliminate the amount you can put in. These are adjusted each year for inflation.
- Single or head of household. Full contribution below a MAGI of $153,000. Contributions phase out between $153,000 and $168,000. At $168,000 or above, no direct contribution is allowed.1Internal Revenue Service. 401(k) Limit Increases to $24,500 for 2026, IRA Limit Increases to $7,500
- Married filing jointly. Full contribution below a MAGI of $242,000. Contributions phase out between $242,000 and $252,000. At $252,000 or above, no direct contribution is allowed.1Internal Revenue Service. 401(k) Limit Increases to $24,500 for 2026, IRA Limit Increases to $7,500
- Married filing separately, if you lived with your spouse at any time during the year. Contributions phase out between $0 and $10,000 of MAGI. At $10,000 or above, no direct contribution is allowed.4Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 408A – Roth IRAs
If your MAGI falls inside a phase-out range, you can still contribute a reduced amount. The IRS provides a formula to calculate the exact figure based on where your MAGI lands. A married filer who lived apart from their spouse for the entire year is treated as single for these purposes.
How to Calculate Your MAGI
Your MAGI starts with the adjusted gross income (AGI) shown on line 11 of Form 1040.5Internal Revenue Service. Adjusted Gross Income From there, you add back specific deductions and exclusions:
- Traditional IRA deduction (Schedule 1, line 20)
- Student loan interest deduction (Schedule 1, line 21)
- Foreign earned income or housing exclusion (Form 2555, line 45)
- Foreign housing deduction (Form 2555, line 50)
- Excludable savings bond interest (Form 8815, line 14)
- Excluded employer-provided adoption benefits (Form 8839, line 30)
You also subtract any income from converting a traditional IRA to a Roth IRA when figuring MAGI for contribution purposes.2Internal Revenue Service. Publication 590-A (2025), Contributions to Individual Retirement Arrangements The full calculation appears in Worksheet 2-1 of IRS Publication 590-A. For most W-2 employees who don’t claim foreign income exclusions, MAGI and AGI will be identical or very close.
2026 Contribution Limits and Deadline
If you qualify, the maximum annual contribution for 2026 is $7,500. If you are age 50 or older at any point during the year, you can add another $1,100, for a total of $8,600.1Internal Revenue Service. 401(k) Limit Increases to $24,500 for 2026, IRA Limit Increases to $7,500 Your contribution cannot exceed your taxable compensation for the year. If you earned only $4,000, that is the most you can put in.
The $7,500 or $8,600 limit applies across all of your traditional and Roth IRAs combined. Contributing $3,000 to a traditional IRA leaves you $4,500 to put in a Roth for that year (assuming you’re under 50).3Internal Revenue Service. Retirement Topics – IRA Contribution Limits
You can make 2026 contributions any time between January 1, 2026, and the tax filing deadline of April 15, 2027. A filing extension does not extend the contribution deadline.2Internal Revenue Service. Publication 590-A (2025), Contributions to Individual Retirement Arrangements
If Your Income Is Too High: The Backdoor Roth
Above the phase-out range, you cannot contribute directly to a Roth IRA, but a two-step workaround exists. First, make a nondeductible contribution to a traditional IRA, which has no income limit for contributions. Then convert that traditional IRA balance to a Roth IRA.
The conversion is straightforward when you hold no other traditional IRA balances. You contribute up to $7,500 (or $8,600 if you’re 50 or older), wait a few days for the funds to settle, and request the conversion. Any earnings between the contribution and conversion are taxable, which is why moving quickly limits the tax hit.
If you already hold pre-tax money in any traditional, SEP, or SIMPLE IRA, the pro-rata rule complicates the picture. The IRS treats all your traditional IRA balances as one pool when calculating taxes on a conversion. If 80 percent of that combined balance is pre-tax money, 80 percent of any conversion is taxable, and you cannot selectively convert only the nondeductible portion.6Internal Revenue Service. Rollovers of After-Tax Contributions in Retirement Plans One common fix is rolling pre-tax IRA balances into an employer 401(k) before doing the conversion, which pulls them out of the pro-rata calculation.
Nondeductible traditional IRA contributions and any Roth conversions get reported on Form 8606 with your tax return.7Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 8606 (2025) Keep careful records of your basis, the total nondeductible contributions you’ve made, so you can calculate the taxable portion of future conversions.