When Do I Need to Take My First RMD: Deadlines and Penalties

You need to take your first required minimum distribution by April 1 of the year after you turn 73. If you were born in 1960 or later, that trigger age is 75 instead. Every RMD after the first is due by December 31 of its own year. Missing the deadline exposes you to an excise tax of up to 25% of what you should have withdrawn, so the timing is worth pinning down early.

Your RMD Starting Age by Birth Year

Congress has moved the starting age several times, and which age applies to you depends on when you were born:

Born before July 1, 1949: RMDs started at age 70½.
Born July 1, 1949 through 1950: starting age is 72, under the SECURE Act of 2019.
Born 1951 through 1959: starting age is 73, under SECURE 2.0.
Born 1960 or later: starting age is 75, which won’t come into play until 2035 at the earliest.

The statute pins these tiers to the ages you reach in particular years rather than to birth year directly. If you turn 72 after December 31, 2022 and turn 73 before January 1, 2033, your applicable age is 73. If you turn 74 after December 31, 2032, your applicable age is 75.¹ The birth-year ranges above are the practical translation.

When Your First Distribution Is Due

Once you hit your applicable age, the IRS calls the deadline for that first withdrawal your “required beginning date.” It’s April 1 of the year after you reach the applicable age. Every RMD after the first is due by December 31 of the year it covers.²

A concrete example: if you turned 73 at any point during 2025, your first RMD covers the 2025 tax year and must be taken no later than April 1, 2026. Your second RMD, for 2026, is due by December 31, 2026. You are not required to wait until April, though. You can take that first distribution any time during the year you turn 73, and for most people that’s the better move.

Why the April Grace Period Often Costs You Money

If you use the April 1 deadline for the first RMD, both that delayed distribution and your regular second-year RMD land on the same tax return. Two years of retirement income compressed into one calendar year can push you into a higher federal bracket.

It can also raise your Medicare premiums. Part B and Part D premiums are set from your modified adjusted gross income two years earlier, so a single-year income spike can trigger IRMAA surcharges for a full year. For 2026, the surcharge starts at income above $109,000 for single filers and $218,000 for married couples filing jointly. Two stacked RMDs is one of the most common ways retirees accidentally cross that line.³

Taking the first distribution by December 31 of the year you reach your applicable age spreads the tax across two calendar years. Same total obligation, less bracket compression, and generally lower Medicare exposure.

If You’re Still Working

If you’re past your applicable RMD age but still employed and participating in your current employer’s retirement plan, you can delay RMDs from that specific plan until the year you actually retire. The plan has to permit the delay, so confirm with your plan administrator.²

Two limits are worth knowing. If you own more than 5% of the business sponsoring the plan, the exception doesn’t apply and you follow the standard schedule. And the delay only covers the plan at your current employer. IRAs and any 401(k) balances left with former employers still follow the normal age-based timeline.³

Which Accounts These Deadlines Apply To

RMDs apply to traditional IRAs (including SEP and SIMPLE IRAs) and to employer-sponsored plans such as 401(k), 403(b), 457(b), and profit-sharing plans.

Roth IRAs are the main exception. The original owner of a Roth IRA never has to take RMDs during their lifetime. Starting in 2024, designated Roth accounts inside employer plans (Roth 401(k) and Roth 403(b) balances) are also exempt from lifetime RMDs.³ If everything you have is in a Roth account you funded yourself, the deadlines in this article don’t touch you.

If You Inherited the Account and the Owner Died Mid-Year

If you inherited a retirement account and the original owner died during a year before taking their RMD for that year, the responsibility falls to you. You have to withdraw whatever amount the owner still owed, by December 31 of the year of death.² It’s easy to miss during the estate-settlement scramble, and the penalty rules below still apply if it slips.

What Happens if You Miss the Deadline

The excise tax on a missed or insufficient RMD is 25% of the shortfall — the amount you were supposed to withdraw minus the amount you actually did. A forgotten $20,000 RMD produces a $5,000 tax bill.⁴

SECURE 2.0 added a shorter path. If you fix the shortfall within the “correction window,” the tax drops to 10%. The window runs through the end of the second taxable year after the year the tax was imposed. A missed 2026 RMD, for example, would have until December 31, 2028 to be corrected at the 10% rate.⁴

You can also ask the IRS to waive the penalty entirely. File Form 5329 with a written explanation attached, and enter “RC” along with the amount you want waived on the dotted line next to line 54. The IRS reviews these requests case by case, and waivers are most often granted when the shortfall came from a reasonable error (a custodian’s processing mistake, a health crisis, confusion during the first RMD year) and the missed amount has already been withdrawn.⁵

If you’re approaching your first RMD year, mark two dates on your calendar: December 31 of the year you turn 73 (or 75), which is the smarter target, and April 1 of the following year, which is the hard legal deadline. Contact your IRA custodian or plan administrator a few months ahead to confirm the amount and set up the distribution. Waiting until late December leaves no room to fix a custodian error before the year closes.

1
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 401 – Qualified Pension, Profit-Sharing, and Stock Bonus Plans
2
Internal Revenue Service. Retirement Topics – Required Minimum Distributions (RMDs)
3
Internal Revenue Service. Retirement Plan and IRA Required Minimum Distributions FAQs
4
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 4974 – Excise Tax on Certain Accumulations in Qualified Retirement Plans
5
Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 5329 (2025) – Additional Taxes on Qualified Plans (Including IRAs) and Other Tax-Favored Accounts