How Do Savings Bonds Mature? 30-Year Terms, EE Doubling, and Taxes

U.S. savings bonds mature 30 years after their issue date. That is the point at which Series EE and Series I bonds stop earning interest for good. Until then, interest is added to the bond internally on the first of every month and compounds every six months, so the value climbs steadily the longer you hold the bond, right up to the 30-year cutoff.¹²

How Interest Accrues and Compounds

Savings bonds do not pay interest in cash installments. The interest is added to the bond’s redemption value. For both Series EE and Series I bonds, interest accrues on the first day of each month and compounds semiannually, meaning every six months the interest already credited begins earning interest of its own.³ That compounding is why a bond’s value accelerates over the decades it is held.

How the rate itself is set depends on the series.

Series EE bonds carry a fixed rate that is locked in at purchase and does not change over the 30 years. Bonds issued from November 2025 through April 2026 earn a fixed rate of 2.50% per year.⁴

Series I bonds earn a composite rate that combines a fixed rate with a variable inflation adjustment tied to the Consumer Price Index. For bonds issued November 2025 through April 2026, the fixed rate is 0.90% and the composite rate is 4.03%. The inflation component resets every six months, so the earnings on an I bond move up and down with inflation over its life.⁴⁵

The 30-Year Final Maturity

Both Series EE and Series I bonds earn interest for a maximum of 30 years from the issue date.¹² Once a bond passes that anniversary, the Treasury stops adding interest. The value is frozen. Holding a bond after final maturity means its dollar figure sits still while inflation reduces what those dollars will buy, so there is no financial reason to leave a matured bond outstanding.

Older series behave differently. The discontinued Series E, for example, ran on schedules that were extended over time and eventually stopped earning. If you are holding any older bond, the Treasury’s free Savings Bond Calculator will tell you whether interest is still being added or the bond has already reached its final maturity date.⁶

The 20-Year Doubling Guarantee for EE Bonds

Series EE bonds carry one maturity milestone that Series I bonds do not. The Treasury guarantees that an EE bond will be worth at least double its purchase price by its 20th anniversary. If the fixed rate has not gotten the bond there on its own, the Treasury makes a one-time adjustment on that date to bring the value up to double.¹ After the adjustment, the bond keeps earning at its fixed rate for the remaining ten years until final maturity at 30. In effect, the doubling promise sets a floor of roughly 3.5% annual return over the first 20 years, regardless of what the stated fixed rate was when the bond was issued.

Series I bonds have no comparable guarantee. Their growth depends entirely on the fixed rate and the semiannual inflation adjustments over the full 30-year run.

When You Can Cash In Before Maturity

Maturity is a ceiling, not a requirement. You can redeem a bond well before 30 years, but two rules shape when it makes sense to do so.

First, there is a 12-month lockout. A savings bond cannot be cashed until at least a year has passed from the issue date, and there are no exceptions.

Second, redeeming between year one and year five costs you the last three months of interest. Cash a bond at 18 months and you receive only the first 15 months of interest earnings. After the five-year mark that penalty disappears, and you receive the full accumulated value whenever you cash it.¹

So a bond’s earning life has three practical phases: locked entirely for the first year, earning but subject to a three-month penalty until year five, and earning freely from year five through year 30.

Checking Your Bond’s Maturity Date

Electronic bonds held in a TreasuryDirect account show the maturity date and current value on screen when you log in. Nothing else is needed.

For paper bonds, look at the certificate itself. The series is printed in the upper right corner, the issue date sits on the right side just below the series, and the denomination is in the upper left corner.⁷ Enter those details into the Savings Bond Calculator at TreasuryDirect.gov and it will return the current value, the current interest rate, the next accrual date, and the final maturity date.⁶ The calculator handles paper Series EE, Series I, and Series E bonds. If the final maturity date shown has already passed, the bond has stopped earning.

What Happens at Maturity for Taxes

Interest on savings bonds is subject to federal income tax and exempt from state and local income tax.⁸ Bondholders can either report the interest each year as it accrues or defer all of it until the bond is cashed, transferred, or reaches final maturity. Most people defer, which means decades of interest arrive as taxable income in a single year.⁹

Here is the trap at the 30-year mark: if you have been deferring and the bond hits final maturity without being cashed, the IRS treats all of the accumulated interest as taxable in the year of maturity anyway. You owe the tax whether or not you have the cash in hand. That is a second reason not to sit on a matured bond. It is no longer earning, and the tax bill has already come due.

An education-related exclusion can reduce that tax hit if the proceeds pay qualified higher education expenses for you, your spouse, or a dependent, but it applies only to EE or I bonds issued after 1989, only to owners who were at least 24 when the bond was issued, and it phases out at higher incomes. The exclusion is claimed on IRS Form 8815.¹⁰

1
TreasuryDirect. EE Bonds
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TreasuryDirect. I Bonds
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eCFR. Part 351 Offering of United States Savings Bonds, Series EE
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TreasuryDirect. Fiscal Service Announces New Savings Bonds Rates
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eCFR. Part 359 Offering of United States Savings Bonds, Series I
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TreasuryDirect. Savings Bond Calculator
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TreasuryDirect. Savings Bond Calculator – Detailed Instructions
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TreasuryDirect. Tax Information for EE and I Bonds
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Internal Revenue Service. Topic No. 403, Interest Received
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IRS.gov. Exclusion of Interest From Series EE and I U.S. Savings Bonds Issued After 1989