The withdrawal the IRS requires, and the deadline that costs 25%
At some point the tax deferral ends and the government wants its share. The age depends on your birth year, the first one has a trap in it, and there is a route that skips the tax entirely.
Most money in a traditional 401(k) or IRA has never been taxed. That was the deal: deduct it going in, pay on the way out. Required minimum distributions are the government collecting on the second half of that arrangement, and they are not optional.
Most, because some traditional IRAs also hold nondeductible contributions — money that was already taxed on the way in. That creates after-tax basis, it is tracked on IRS Form 8606, and it means part of each withdrawal is not taxable again. If you ever made a contribution you could not deduct, this applies to you and it is worth telling whoever prepares your return.
Three things about them catch people, and the first is that the starting age is no longer a single number.
| When they start | Age 73 if you were born between 1951 and 1959. Age 75 if you were born in 1960 or later. |
|---|---|
| The annual deadline | 31 December, every year after the first. |
| The first one only | You may delay it to 1 April of the following year — which is where the trap is. |
| Missing one | A 25% excise tax on whatever you failed to withdraw. It drops to 10% if you correct it within the IRS window, generally two years. |
| Which accounts | Traditional IRAs, SEP and SIMPLE IRAs, and most workplace plans. Roth IRAs have never required them for the original owner. |
| The charitable route | A qualified charitable distribution from an IRA, available from age 70½, up to $111,000 per person in 2026 — $222,000 for a married couple each giving from their own IRA. |
The first-year trap
The rule that lets you delay your first withdrawal to 1 April sounds like a kindness. Used carelessly it is expensive, because the second one is still due on 31 December of that same year.
Delay the first and you take two distributions in one calendar year. Both land in the same tax return, stacked on top of each other. That can push you into a higher bracket, make more of your Social Security taxable, and — the one people do not see coming — raise your income above an IRMAA threshold, which sets your Medicare premium two years later.
Sometimes doubling up genuinely is the right call, if the following year's income will be much lower. But it should be a decision, not a side effect of not getting round to it in December.
Also on The Second Half Guide The Medicare deadline that never forgives you Almost every date in this decade is negotiable. This one isn’t — miss your enrollment window without the right coverage and you pay a surcharge every month for the rest of your life. Read it →The penalty is real, and it is survivable
Miss a distribution and the excise tax is 25% of the amount you should have taken. Not 25% of your account, and not a tax on the withdrawal itself — a penalty on the shortfall, on top of the ordinary income tax you still owe when you do take it.
It used to be 50%, which was among the harshest penalties in the tax code. SECURE 2.0 cut it, and added something more useful: correct the mistake within the IRS's window, generally two years, and the penalty falls to 10%. There is also a waiver route — file Form 5329 promptly and show the miss had reasonable cause — and the IRS does grant it.
So a missed distribution is a problem to fix quickly rather than a catastrophe to panic about. The expensive version is the one nobody notices for years.
The part worth knowing if you give to charity
A qualified charitable distribution sends money straight from your IRA to a charity, and it never counts as your income at all.
That last clause is the whole point, and it is why a QCD beats writing a check and claiming a deduction. A deduction only helps if you itemize, and most people over 65 do not. A QCD works regardless, because the money never appears in your income in the first place — which also keeps it out of the calculations that key off your income, including the taxable share of your Social Security and the IRMAA thresholds that set your Medicare premium.
- Available from age 70½ — earlier than RMDs begin, so there are years when you can do this before you are required to withdraw anything.
- Up to $111,000 per person in 2026. A married couple can each give that much from their own IRA.
- It counts toward your RMD for the year, up to the amount given.
- It must go directly from the IRA to the charity. Money that passes through your hands first is an ordinary withdrawal, taxed as one.
- It has to be a qualifying charity. Donor-advised funds and private foundations generally do not count.
The deadline is 31 December, and it is a real one. Custodians get busy in the last week of December, and a transfer that does not complete in time counts as missed.
What to actually do
Find your age. Born 1951 to 1959, it is 73. Born 1960 or later, it is 75. This changed under SECURE 2.0 and a great deal of material still in circulation says 73 for everyone.
Do it in November. Not late December. Custodians are slow at year end, paperwork gets returned, and the deadline does not care why the transfer failed to settle.
If you have several accounts, the rules on which ones can be combined differ between IRAs and workplace plans. This is the part where people miscalculate in good faith, and it is worth asking your custodian rather than assuming.
If you give to charity anyway, ask whether a QCD suits you before you write the check. Same money to the same charity, and it can be worth materially more to you.
This is general information, not personal advice. We report the rules, the numbers and the deadlines as clearly as we can. We don't know your income, your state, your health or your family — and all four can change the answer. Treat this as a good place to find the right questions, not a substitute for someone looking at your actual situation.
Where these facts come from
Checked on 10 August 2026 against the sources listed below. Dollar limits and program rules change — if you're reading this well after that date, verify the numbers at the links below.
- IRS — Required minimum distributions — https://www.irs.gov/retirement-plans/retirement-plan-and-ira-required-minimum-distributions-faqs
- IRS — Retirement plan and IRA required minimum distributions — https://www.irs.gov/retirement-plans/plan-participant-employee/retirement-topics-required-minimum-distributions-rmd
- Congressional Research Service — Qualified charitable distributions from IRAs — https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/IF11377
- IRS — Form 5329 — https://www.irs.gov/forms-pubs/about-form-5329
Edward Silva
Edward spent more than forty years as a computer professional — long enough to pick up one useful occupational habit: when somebody hands you a summary, go and read the actual documentation. He started The Second Half Guide after noticing that most writing aimed at people his age was either talking down to him or quietly selling him something, and that the plain facts — the dates, the thresholds, the dollar figures — were somehow the hardest part to find.
He's married, with two grown sons, both married themselves. He is not a financial adviser, an attorney or an insurance agent, and this site doesn't tell you what to do with your money. It tells you what the rules actually say, and links to where he checked.