To tell if your IRA is Roth or Traditional, log into your brokerage or bank and read the label next to the account number: it will say “Traditional IRA,” “Roth IRA,” or a variant like “Rollover IRA.” If the label is unclear or missing, IRS Form 5498 (Box 7) settles it, and your Form 1099-R and past tax returns give secondary confirmation. Getting this right matters because the two account types are taxed at opposite ends of the timeline, and mistaking one for the other can lead to overpaying tax or triggering penalties you never saw coming.
Start With Your Account Statement or Online Portal
This takes about thirty seconds. Every custodian labels IRA accounts on both paper statements and digital dashboards. Look near the top of the statement, next to the account number, or in the account summary of your online portal. A Traditional IRA usually appears as “Traditional IRA” or simply “IRA.” A Roth account will always include the word “Roth,” because financial institutions are required to distinguish the two for tax reporting.
A few labels can throw people off:
- “Rollover IRA” is treated as a Traditional IRA for tax purposes. The label just tells you the money originally came from an employer plan like a 401(k). Tax treatment is identical to a standard Traditional IRA.
- “Beneficiary IRA” or “Inherited IRA” means the account was inherited. The title usually includes both your name as beneficiary and the deceased owner’s name. Inherited accounts follow special distribution rules, including the 10-year withdrawal requirement for most non-spouse beneficiaries who inherited after 2019. The inherited account itself can be Traditional or Roth, and the statement should say which.1Internal Revenue Service. Retirement Plan and IRA Required Minimum Distributions FAQs
Confirm With IRS Form 5498
Form 5498, “IRA Contribution Information,” is the IRS’s own record of the account type. Your custodian files it every year and sends you a copy. Box 7 contains checkboxes for IRA (meaning Traditional), SEP, SIMPLE, or Roth IRA.2Internal Revenue Service. Form 5498 IRA Contribution Information 2025 Whichever box is checked tells you what you have. The contribution boxes back this up: Box 1 reports Traditional IRA contributions and Box 10 reports Roth contributions.
One quirk causes people to overlook this form. Custodians don’t have to send Form 5498 until June 1, which is well after the April filing deadline.3Internal Revenue Service. 2025 Instructions for Forms 1099-R and 5498 By the time it arrives, most people have stopped thinking about taxes. If you can’t find yours, request a duplicate from the custodian or pull a Wage and Income Transcript from the IRS, which includes the 5498 data your custodian reported.4Internal Revenue Service. Get Your Tax Records and Transcripts
Read the Codes on Form 1099-R
If you’ve taken a distribution from the account, Form 1099-R gives you a second read. Box 7 uses distribution codes that reveal the account type. Roth IRA distributions carry code Q (qualified, tax-free), code J (early Roth), or code T (Roth where the custodian isn’t sure whether the five-year holding period has been met). Traditional IRA distributions typically carry code 7 (normal distribution after 59½) or code 1 (early distribution before 59½).5Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Forms 1099-R and 5498 (2025)
There is a small but telling detail near Box 7: the IRA/SEP/SIMPLE checkbox. Custodians check it for Traditional, SEP, and SIMPLE IRA distributions and leave it blank for Roth IRA distributions.5Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Forms 1099-R and 5498 (2025) An unchecked box with a J, Q, or T in Box 7 means you’re looking at a Roth account.
Cross-Check Past Tax Returns
Your old returns reveal a pattern. Deductible Traditional IRA contributions show up on Line 20 of Schedule 1 (Form 1040), labeled “IRA deduction.” A dollar amount on that line in the year you contributed means the account is a Traditional IRA and the money went in pre-tax.6Internal Revenue Service. IRA Deduction Limits
Roth IRA contributions never appear as a deduction on any tax return, because they are made with after-tax dollars.7Internal Revenue Service. Roth IRAs So if you contributed in a given year and see no deduction on Schedule 1, the account is probably a Roth. Read the next section before you rely on that inference, though, because there is one important exception.
If you no longer have the returns, request a Tax Return Transcript from the IRS online or by mailing Form 4506-T. The transcript shows the adjustments to income on your original return, including any IRA deduction.4Internal Revenue Service. Get Your Tax Records and Transcripts
Watch Out for the Nondeductible Traditional IRA
This is where most people misidentify an account. Not every Traditional IRA contribution is deductible. If your income exceeded certain thresholds or you were covered by a workplace retirement plan, your Traditional IRA contributions may have been nondeductible, meaning you paid tax on the money before contributing, just like a Roth.6Internal Revenue Service. IRA Deduction Limits No deduction on Schedule 1 does not automatically mean the account is a Roth.
The document that clears this up is IRS Form 8606, “Nondeductible IRAs.” Anyone who made nondeductible Traditional IRA contributions should have filed Form 8606 that year. Part I of the form tracks your basis, the running total of after-tax dollars inside the Traditional IRA.8Internal Revenue Service. 2025 Instructions for Form 8606 – Nondeductible IRAs A Form 8606 in your records means you have a Traditional IRA with nondeductible contributions, not a Roth.
The distinction matters at withdrawal. Roth qualified distributions come out entirely tax-free. In a nondeductible Traditional IRA, your original contributions come out tax-free but the earnings are taxed as ordinary income. Treating a nondeductible Traditional IRA as a Roth can lead you to underreport taxable earnings on withdrawal.
Call Your Custodian When Records Don’t Resolve It
When statements are ambiguous and the tax forms aren’t in front of you, calling the custodian is faster than anything else. A representative can pull the account’s legal structure from internal records and confirm whether it was opened as a Traditional, Roth, SEP, or SIMPLE IRA. Ask for the designation in writing — a secure message, an email, or an updated account profile — so you have a permanent record.
If a local branch is available, bringing a government-issued ID lets the representative access the original application paperwork. That helps when the account was opened years ago by a spouse, a parent, or a former advisor and you weren’t part of the decision.
The custodian is also the right contact if a contribution was ever recharacterized, meaning it was originally made to one type of IRA and then moved to the other. Recharacterizations generate specific codes on Form 1099-R (Code N for current year, Code R for prior year) and are also reported on Form 5498.2Internal Revenue Service. Form 5498 IRA Contribution Information 2025 If one happened without your knowledge, the custodian’s records will show it.
SEP and SIMPLE IRAs Look Similar on the Forms
If you’re self-employed or work for a small business, you may have a SEP IRA or SIMPLE IRA instead of, or alongside, a standard account. These are employer-sponsored retirement accounts built on the IRA structure, and they’re clearly identified on the forms you’re already checking. Form 5498 Box 7 has separate checkboxes for SEP and SIMPLE, and SEP contributions appear in Box 8 while SIMPLE contributions appear in Box 9.2Internal Revenue Service. Form 5498 IRA Contribution Information 2025 Your account statement will typically include “SEP” or “SIMPLE” in the account name too. Both are taxed like Traditional IRAs, with contributions going in pre-tax and withdrawals fully taxable.
Keep the Paperwork Longer Than You Think
The general IRS rule is to keep tax records for three years after the filing deadline.9Internal Revenue Service. How Long Should I Keep Records? For IRAs, three years is not enough. You need to prove your contribution basis and, for a Roth, when you first funded the account, for as long as the account exists. Keep every Form 5498, every Form 8606, and any records of contributions or conversions until three years after you fully drain the account.
Roth IRA contributions don’t appear anywhere on your tax return, so your Form 5498 copies and personal records may be the only proof that contributions were made with after-tax dollars. For Traditional IRAs with nondeductible contributions, Form 8606 is your running ledger of after-tax basis; losing those forms means you could end up paying income tax on withdrawals that should have been partially tax-free. The IRS won’t reconstruct that history for you.