How to Use IRS Life Expectancy Tables for RMD Calculations

The IRS life expectancy tables for RMD calculations live in Publication 590-B, and there are three of them: the Uniform Lifetime Table (Table III), the Joint and Last Survivor Expectancy Table (Table II), and the Single Life Expectancy Table (Table I). You pick one based on your situation, look up your age, and divide your prior year-end account balance by the factor next to that age. The result is the required minimum distribution you must withdraw before the deadline.¹

Which Table Applies to You

Most account owners use the Uniform Lifetime Table. It assumes a beneficiary exactly ten years younger than you, regardless of who your actual beneficiary is or whether you’ve named one. You use it if you’re unmarried, if your spouse is your beneficiary but not more than ten years younger, or if your beneficiary is anyone other than your spouse.¹

You use the Joint and Last Survivor Table only when your spouse is your sole beneficiary and is more than ten years younger than you. Because it accounts for two lifespans with a real age gap, it produces the largest distribution periods and therefore the smallest annual withdrawals, preserving more of the account for the younger spouse.¹

The Single Life Expectancy Table is primarily for beneficiaries who inherit a retirement account and qualify to stretch distributions over their own life expectancy. It produces faster withdrawals than the Uniform Lifetime Table because it’s based on one person’s lifespan. A 65-year-old beneficiary using this table has a factor of 22.9.¹

The decision comes down to a few clean cases:

You own the account and your spouse is not your sole beneficiary: Uniform Lifetime Table.
You own the account, your spouse is the sole beneficiary, and your spouse is not more than 10 years younger: Uniform Lifetime Table.
You own the account, your spouse is the sole beneficiary, and your spouse is more than 10 years younger: Joint and Last Survivor Table.
You inherited the account and qualify as an eligible designated beneficiary: Single Life Expectancy Table.

Married couples whose age gap falls right around ten years should double-check the math. The difference between Table III and Table II can meaningfully change your annual withdrawal and tax bill.

How to Run the Calculation

You need two numbers: your account balance as of December 31 of the prior year, and the distribution period from the correct table.²

Your age for table purposes is the age you will turn by December 31 of the distribution year, even if your birthday hasn’t happened yet. Find that age in the first column of the correct table, read the factor in the second column, and divide your prior-year balance by that factor.

Here’s a worked example. You’re 73 in 2026, and your traditional IRA balance was $500,000 on December 31, 2025. Using the Uniform Lifetime Table, your factor is 26.5. Your RMD is $500,000 ÷ 26.5 = $18,867.92. That’s the minimum you must withdraw before December 31, 2026. You can always take more. You cannot take less.³

Run the calculation fresh every year. The factor drops as you age, so the required percentage of your balance climbs. At age 80 the factor is 20.2, meaning roughly 5% of the account must come out. By your late 80s and 90s the percentages rise steeply.

Uniform Lifetime Factors at Common Ages

These are the distribution periods for the ages when most people begin taking RMDs:³

Age 73: 26.5
Age 74: 25.5
Age 75: 24.6
Age 76: 23.7
Age 77: 22.9
Age 78: 22.0
Age 79: 21.1
Age 80: 20.2

When You Own More Than One Account

If you own multiple IRAs, calculate the RMD separately for each, then withdraw the combined total from any single IRA or split it however you like. The same aggregation rule applies to multiple 403(b) accounts.⁴

Employer-sponsored plans like 401(k)s work differently. Each 401(k) must satisfy its own RMD from its own assets. You cannot take a 401(k) RMD from an IRA, and you cannot combine two 401(k) RMDs and pull them from one plan. This trips up people who have old 401(k)s at former employers alongside their current IRAs.

Accounts These Tables Don’t Cover

Roth IRAs require no distributions during the owner’s lifetime, so the tables don’t apply to you while you’re alive. Beginning in 2024, Roth accounts inside employer plans like 401(k)s and 403(b)s also no longer require RMDs. If your savings sit entirely in Roth accounts, you can set the tables aside.

Inherited Accounts and the Right Table

The rules for inherited retirement accounts changed in 2020. Most non-spouse beneficiaries who inherit from someone who died in 2020 or later must empty the entire account by the end of the tenth year following the owner’s death.⁵ Under this rule the tables mainly serve to calculate annual distributions during the ten-year window when the original owner had already started RMDs before death.

Five categories of beneficiaries are exempt from the 10-year rule and use the Single Life Expectancy Table to stretch distributions:⁵

Surviving spouse
Minor child of the deceased owner, until reaching the age of majority (after which the 10-year clock starts)
Disabled individual
Chronically ill individual
Someone not more than 10 years younger than the deceased owner

A surviving spouse has an extra option. They can roll the inherited account into their own IRA, at which point it’s treated as always theirs.⁵ They then use the Uniform Lifetime Table on their own age and don’t start RMDs until 73. For a younger surviving spouse, the rollover can defer distributions for years compared with using the Single Life Expectancy Table.

One note if you inherited before 2022 and use the Single Life Expectancy Table: the IRS updated the tables effective January 1, 2022, and allowed existing beneficiaries a one-time reset to the new factor rather than continuing to subtract one from the old factor each year.⁶ If you never recalculated, you may have been withdrawing more than required.

What Happens If You Use the Wrong Table or Come Up Short

Picking the wrong table doesn’t just create paperwork. If you withdraw less than the required amount, the IRS imposes an excise tax of 25% on the shortfall.⁷ On an $18,868 RMD you missed entirely, that’s $4,717 in excise tax on top of the income tax you’ll owe on the distribution anyway.

The rate drops to 10% if you fix the mistake within the correction window, which generally runs through the end of the second tax year after the year the shortfall occurred.⁸ You take the missed distribution and file Form 5329 reflecting the corrected amount during that window.

The IRS can also waive the penalty entirely if the shortfall resulted from a reasonable error and you’ve taken steps to fix it. You request the waiver by attaching an explanation to Form 5329, entering “RC” on the dotted line next to line 54, and showing the amount you’re asking to be waived.⁹ A first-time miss with a reasonable explanation often gets approved. Repeated failures are a harder sell.

1
Internal Revenue Service. Publication 590-B – Distributions from Individual Retirement Arrangements (IRAs) – Section: Which Table Do You Use
2
Internal Revenue Service. Retirement Plan and IRA Required Minimum Distributions FAQs
3
Internal Revenue Service. Publication 590-B – Distributions from Individual Retirement Arrangements (IRAs) – Section: Appendix B
4
Internal Revenue Service. RMD Comparison Chart (IRAs vs. Defined Contribution Plans)
5
Internal Revenue Service. Retirement Topics – Beneficiary
6
Internal Revenue Service. Publication 590-B, Distributions from Individual Retirement Arrangements (IRAs)
7
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 4974 – Excise Tax on Certain Accumulations in Qualified Retirement Plans
8
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 4974 – Excise Tax on Certain Accumulations in Qualified Retirement Plans – Section: Reduction of Tax in Certain Cases
9
Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 5329