The standard deduction increased for 2026 for two reasons working together. Federal law requires the IRS to raise it each year to keep pace with inflation, and the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed on July 4, 2025, reset the baseline amounts higher and made permanent the larger deduction first enacted in 2017. The result for 2026 is $16,100 for single filers, $32,200 for married couples filing jointly, and $24,150 for heads of household.1Internal Revenue Service. IRS Releases Tax Inflation Adjustments for Tax Year 2026, Including Amendments from the One, Big, Beautiful Bill
The Annual Inflation Adjustment
Every fall, the IRS recalculates the standard deduction along with tax brackets and dozens of other figures. Without those updates, someone earning the same real income year after year would owe progressively more federal tax simply because a dollar buys less. Congress addressed that bracket creep by requiring automatic updates tied to a price index.2Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 1 – Tax Imposed
The index the IRS uses is the Chained Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers, or C-CPI-U. It tracks a basket of goods and services, and unlike the older CPI it accounts for the fact that shoppers substitute cheaper alternatives when prices rise. That adjustment makes the chained index grow roughly 0.25 to 0.3 percentage points more slowly per year than the traditional measure. In any single year the gap looks trivial. Over a decade it compounds into a standard deduction hundreds of dollars lower than the older method would have produced, and a slightly higher tax bill to match.3Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 1 – Tax Imposed – Section: Cost-of-Living Adjustment
The IRS looks at C-CPI-U data through August, calculates the percentage change, and applies it to the prior year’s figures. The results are published in a Revenue Procedure each fall so employers and taxpayers can update withholding before January. For 2026, those figures appeared in Revenue Procedure 2025-32.4Internal Revenue Service. Revenue Procedure 2025-32
The 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act Nearly Doubled the Baseline
Inflation produces steady, modest bumps. The dramatic leap came from legislation. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (Public Law 115-97) rewrote the standard deduction provisions in 26 U.S.C. § 63, roughly doubling the amounts that had been in place for decades.5Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 63 – Taxable Income Defined Before that law took effect in 2018, a married couple filing jointly had a standard deduction of $12,700 and could claim a $4,050 personal exemption for each family member. The TCJA eliminated the personal exemption entirely and folded that relief into a much larger standard deduction.6Tax Policy Center. What Is the Standard Deduction?
Millions of households that previously itemized mortgage interest, charitable gifts, and medical expenses found the new standard deduction exceeded their itemized total. Filing became simpler for most people. Taxpayers in high-tax states with large mortgages sometimes lost ground, because the same law capped the state and local tax (SALT) deduction at $10,000.
As originally written, that higher standard deduction was temporary. It was scheduled to expire after the 2025 tax year, which would have meant a sharp drop for 2026 returns. That sunset never happened.
The 2025 Law That Made the Increase Permanent
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed into law on July 4, 2025, made the TCJA’s increased standard deduction permanent and nudged the base amounts slightly higher. The new statutory floors are $15,750 for single filers, $23,625 for heads of household, and $31,500 for married couples filing jointly. Annual inflation adjustments now build on top of those figures, which is how 2026 arrives at $16,100, $24,150, and $32,200.5Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 63 – Taxable Income Defined
The law also made the elimination of the personal exemption permanent. Under the TCJA’s original terms, personal exemptions would have returned in 2026 and partially offset a lower standard deduction. With the OBBBA in place, the personal exemption remains at zero.1Internal Revenue Service. IRS Releases Tax Inflation Adjustments for Tax Year 2026, Including Amendments from the One, Big, Beautiful Bill
The OBBBA also raised the SALT deduction cap to $40,400 for 2026, with a phasedown for modified adjusted gross income above $505,000 that bottoms out at $10,000 for the highest earners. The $750,000 limit on deductible mortgage debt was made permanent as well, ending the possibility of a reversion to the pre-TCJA $1 million threshold. Both changes matter for taxpayers deciding whether to itemize.
2026 Amounts by Filing Status
The 2026 standard deduction figures published in Revenue Procedure 2025-32 are:4Internal Revenue Service. Revenue Procedure 2025-32
- Single or married filing separately: $16,100
- Married filing jointly or surviving spouse: $32,200
- Head of household: $24,150
The married-filing-jointly figure is always exactly double the single amount. Head of household falls in between. Each figure is rounded to the nearest $50 to keep tax tables and withholding calculations clean.
Extra Amounts for Age 65 and Older or Blind
Taxpayers who are 65 or older, legally blind, or both receive an extra standard deduction on top of the base. For 2025, that additional amount was $1,600 per qualifying condition if you are married and $2,000 if you are unmarried and not a surviving spouse. The 2026 figures adjust for inflation. A taxpayer who is both over 65 and blind receives the additional amount twice.7Internal Revenue Service. Topic No. 551, Standard Deduction
The OBBBA also created a separate new deduction for seniors, available for tax years 2025 through 2028. One IRS page describes it as $4,000 per individual and $8,000 for a qualifying couple, with a phaseout starting at $75,000 of modified adjusted gross income for single filers and $150,000 for joint filers.8Internal Revenue Service. One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act – Tax Deductions for Working Americans and Seniors A separate IRS eligibility page describes the same deduction as $6,000 per individual and $12,000 per qualifying couple.9Internal Revenue Service. Check Your Eligibility for the New Enhanced Deduction for Seniors If you are 65 or older, especially near the phaseout thresholds, check the most current IRS guidance or a tax professional before relying on a specific number.
Does the Higher Deduction Change Whether You Should Itemize
Every increase raises the bar that itemized deductions have to clear. For a married couple in 2026, mortgage interest, charitable contributions, state and local taxes, and qualifying medical expenses would need to exceed $32,200 combined before itemizing saves anything. The OBBBA’s higher SALT cap helps some high-income households in high-tax states get over that bar. For most filers the math still favors the standard deduction.1Internal Revenue Service. IRS Releases Tax Inflation Adjustments for Tax Year 2026, Including Amendments from the One, Big, Beautiful Bill
The taxpayers most likely to benefit from itemizing are homeowners with large mortgages in states with high income or property taxes, people who made substantial charitable donations, and anyone with unreimbursed medical expenses exceeding 7.5% of adjusted gross income. If none of those describe you, the standard deduction is almost certainly the better choice, and its continued climb reinforces that each year.