What age do TSP required minimum distributions start?

It depends on your birth year. SECURE 2.0 section 107 raised the age to 73, and to 75 for anyone born in 1960 or later. TSP administers it in two bands and states them plainly in TSPBK26: born before 1960, your RMD age is 73; born 1960 or later, it is 75. There is a second condition people forget. A TSP RMD does not begin until you have both reached that age and separated from federal service, so a 76 year old still on the payroll owes nothing from the TSP.

How is the TSP RMD actually calculated?

One division. TSP takes your traditional balance as of December 31 of the prior year and divides it by the distribution period for the age you reach during the current year, read from the IRS Uniform Lifetime Table. The booklet works the example itself: a participant who reaches 75 with $246,000 on the prior December 31 has a period of 24.6 years, so the RMD is $246,000 divided by 24.6, which is $10,000. Nothing about your contributions, your returns, or your current balance enters it.

Does Roth TSP have a required minimum distribution?

Not during your lifetime, starting with 2024. SECURE 2.0 section 325 removed pre-death RMDs from designated Roth accounts for 2024 and later years; for 2022 and 2023 the Roth balance still counted in the RMD, which is why this calculator starts at 2024. TSPBK26 puts it directly: the RMD calculation includes only your traditional balance, and distributions of Roth money do not count toward satisfying the RMD. A large Roth balance therefore does nothing to your required amount, which is one of the strongest arguments for converting before your RMD age.

When is my first RMD actually due?

April 1 of the year after your first distribution calendar year, which the IRS calls your required beginning date. Every RMD after that is due December 31 of its own year. The trap is in the second year: if you delay the first RMD to the April 1 deadline, both the first and the second land inside the same tax year, and two years of required income stacked together can move you up a bracket or past an IRMAA threshold.

What is the penalty for missing a TSP RMD?

An excise tax of 25% of the amount you should have taken, under 26 U.S.C. 4974 as amended by SECURE 2.0 section 302. It drops to 10% if you correct the shortfall and file inside the correction window. TSP says it will send your RMD automatically by the deadline, so the usual cause of a miss is not forgetfulness. It is a wrong date of birth in your TSP record, or an agency that reported your separation late. Both are worth checking in My Account before you reach your RMD age (73, or 75 if you were born in 1960 or later).

Can a younger spouse reduce my TSP RMD?

It lowers the tax-law minimum, but not what TSP sends you. If your spouse is your sole designated beneficiary and more than 10 years younger, Treasury regulation 1.401(a)(9)-5(c)(2) sets your legal minimum from the Joint Life and Last Survivor Table, which has a longer period. At 73 with a 55 year old spouse the factor is 32.6 rather than 26.5, so on a $500,000 balance the legal minimum is $15,337 instead of $18,868. TSP does not offer that table. TSPBK26 says TSP calculates your RMD with the Uniform Lifetime Table and automatically sends any amount still required, so TSP will pay out the $18,868 and the extra $3,531 is taxable income that year. Only the legal minimum is barred from rollover under 26 CFR 1.402(c)-2(f)(1), so the extra may be eligible for a 60-day rollover to an IRA if it otherwise qualifies; check with a tax adviser. A gap of exactly 10 years does not qualify for the Joint Life table at all. This calculator shows both figures.

Does a Roth conversion satisfy my RMD?

No, and TSPBK26 says so explicitly: a Roth in-plan conversion does not satisfy the RMD because the money never leaves your TSP account. You have to take the RMD out first, in cash, and then convert anything beyond it. The same logic applies to rollovers. An RMD is not eligible to roll over to an IRA or another employer plan, so you cannot shelter it by moving it.

Can I use a qualified charitable distribution for my TSP RMD?

No. A qualified charitable distribution is defined in 26 U.S.C. 408(d)(8)(B) as a distribution "from an individual retirement plan", meaning an IRA. The TSP is an employer plan, not an IRA, so a TSP RMD cannot be satisfied with a QCD. Some retirees roll TSP money they are not required to take into an IRA in earlier years and make QCDs from the IRA once they qualify, but the TSP RMD itself always comes out as taxable income.

Why does the required percentage rise every year?

Because the distribution period shrinks as you age. At 73 you divide by 26.5, which is 3.77% of the balance. At 80 you divide by 20.2, or 4.95%. At 90 you divide by 12.2, or 8.20%. The ten year table in this calculator shows that share climbing alongside the dollar amount, which is the part that catches people planning around a flat withdrawal rate.

Calculator

TSP Required Minimum Distribution

Find your RMD age, your first deadline, and the amount TSP will send from your traditional balance this year. Then look ten years ahead, because the required share of your balance rises every single year while the distribution period shrinks.

Reviewed by Jonathan D., 20-year federal employee · Formulas verified against IRS and TSP.gov · Updated October 2026

Rule snapshot

Reviewed October 3, 2026 · Sources: Treas. Reg. 1.401(a)(9)-9 (IRS life expectancy tables), Treas. Reg. 1.401(a)(9)-5 (Joint Life for a spouse more than 10 years younger), IRS Pub 590-B, TSP: Tax Rules about TSP Payments (TSPBK26), 26 U.S.C. 4974 (excise tax) · Inputs stay in your browser. Nothing you type is sent to a server or saved.

Your account and your age

Traditional balance on Dec 31 last yearThe RMD is always calculated from the prior December 31 balance, not from today.

Roth balance (optional)Roth TSP has no lifetime RMD since 2024. We show it so you can see it excluded.

Year you were bornBorn 1951 to 1959, your RMD age is 73. Born 1960 or later, it is 75. Born 1949 or earlier, we also ask your birth month.

Distribution yearThe calendar year the distribution would come out, 2024 or later. Earlier years ran on different Roth and excise rules.

Year you retired (or will retire)The calendar year you separated from federal service. Your first required distribution year is the later of this and the year you reach your RMD age, so working past your RMD age pushes the deadline back (26 U.S.C. 401(a)(9)(C)(i)).

Projection return (%)Used only for the ten year table. It does not change this year's RMD.

I have separated from federal service, or I am planning for a year after I will have (enter that year below). TSP RMDs do not begin until you have both reached your RMD age and left government, and the April 1 deadline runs from the later of those two years, not from your birthday alone.My spouse is my sole beneficiary and is more than 10 years younger than me. Tax law then sets a lower minimum from the Joint Life table. TSP still calculates and sends the Uniform Lifetime amount, so we show both figures.

What this models, and what it does not

Read the second list before you act on the number.

What this models

RMD age 73 for anyone born before 1960 and 75 for 1960 or later, which is how TSP administers SECURE 2.0 section 107. For births in 1949 or earlier the tool asks the birth month, because 26 CFR 1.401(a)(9)-2(b)(2) sets age 70 1/2 for births before July 1, 1949 and age 72 after
The separation condition. A TSP RMD does not begin until you have both reached the age and left federal service
The prior December 31 traditional balance as the divisor base, per Treasury regulation 1.401(a)(9)-5(b)(1)
The full IRS Uniform Lifetime Table, ages 72 through 120 and older
What TSP will send: your balance divided by the Uniform Lifetime factor, the only table TSP uses (TSPBK26 p. 12), with any shortfall paid automatically
The lower tax-law minimum from the Joint Life and Last Survivor Table when a sole beneficiary spouse is more than 10 years younger, shown next to the TSP figure with the gap between them
The April 1 required beginning date and the warning that two RMDs can land in the second year
Roth TSP excluded entirely, under SECURE 2.0 section 325, which applies to distribution years 2024 and later
The 25 percent excise tax on a missed RMD and the 10 percent corrected figure, the rates for 2023 onward (SECURE 2.0 section 302)
A ten year projection at an editable return, showing the required share of the balance climbing

Not modeled

Distribution years before 2024. For 2022 and 2023 the RMD was figured on traditional AND Roth balances, because the SECURE 2.0 section 325 Roth exemption "shall not apply to distributions which are required with respect to years beginning before January 1, 2024", and a missed 2022 RMD carried the old 50 percent excise with no 10 percent correction rate (section 302 applies to taxable years beginning after December 29, 2022). The calculator refuses those years and says why rather than price them on 2024 law
The tax on the RMD itself. Use the TSP Withdrawal Tax Calculator for that
Inherited and beneficiary participant accounts. Those run on different tables and a different timetable, and the Single Life Table applies instead
RMDs from IRAs or other employer plans. Each plan computes and pays its own, and a TSP RMD cannot be aggregated with an IRA RMD
The still-working rule for OTHER employer plans. This tool applies it to the TSP, where it belongs: 26 U.S.C. 401(a)(9)(C)(i) sets your deadline from the later of your applicable-age year and your retirement year, and 401(a)(9)(C)(iv) keeps the governmental-plan exception intact. What is not modeled is the same rule on a non-TSP plan
Qualified charitable distributions. These are IRA-only under 26 U.S.C. 408(d)(8)(B), so a TSP RMD cannot be satisfied with one
Precision limit: ages are whole years, matching how the IRS tables and TSP both work. A birthday late in the year does not change the factor
Precision limit: the projection assumes one constant return and one RMD a year taken at year start. Real sequencing will differ
Precision limit: the Joint and Last Survivor table here covers owner ages 72 to 120 and older against every spouse age the table can legally be used for (0 up to eleven years younger). Outside that range the tool still shows what TSP will send and points you at Table II of Publication 590-B for the tax-law minimum

The required share climbs, which is the part that surprises people

A required minimum distribution is not a fixed percentage. The IRS divides your balance by a distribution period that shrinks every year you age, so the share you must take out rises on a schedule you cannot change. At 73 you divide by 26.5, which is 3.77 percent. At 80 you divide by 20.2, or 4.95 percent. At 90 the divisor is 12.2 and the required share is 8.20 percent.

That matters for anyone who planned retirement income around a flat four percent withdrawal. The RMD overtakes four percent at 75, where the divisor is 24.6 and the required share is 4.07 percent, and it keeps climbing from there. If your traditional balance is large and your FERS annuity and Social Security already fill your lower brackets, the forced distribution lands on top at your highest marginal rate, year after year.

The IRS Uniform Lifetime Table

This is the table TSP uses. The right column is the figure almost nobody publishes alongside it: the share of the balance that a given period forces out, which is simply one divided by the period.

IRS Uniform Lifetime Table distribution periods with the implied required share of the balance
Age reached this year	Distribution period	Required share of balance	RMD on $500,000
72	27.4	3.65%	$18,248
73	26.5	3.77%	$18,868
74	25.5	3.92%	$19,608
75	24.6	4.07%	$20,325
76	23.7	4.22%	$21,097
77	22.9	4.37%	$21,834
78	22.0	4.55%	$22,727
79	21.1	4.74%	$23,697
80	20.2	4.95%	$24,752
82	18.5	5.41%	$27,027
85	16.0	6.25%	$31,250
88	13.7	7.30%	$36,496
90	12.2	8.20%	$40,984
95	8.9	11.24%	$56,180
100	6.4	15.63%	$78,125

Distribution periods: Treas. Reg. 1.401(a)(9)-9(c), reprinted as Table III in IRS Publication 590-B Appendix B and on page 23 of TSPBK26. The required share and dollar columns are FedTools calculations from those periods. Full table ages 72 to 120 is inside the calculator. Reviewed October 2026.

What shrinks the RMD, and what a younger spouse does not change

The first is the Roth exclusion. Since 2024, under SECURE 2.0 section 325, designated Roth accounts carry no lifetime RMD, and TSPBK26 confirms the calculation includes only your traditional balance. Every dollar you move from traditional to Roth before your RMD age is a dollar permanently out of the RMD base. Our Roth conversion calculator models the trade between paying tax now and being forced to pay it later.

A much younger spouse is different. When your spouse is your sole designated beneficiary and more than 10 years younger, Treasury regulation 1.401(a)(9)-5(c)(2) sets your tax-law minimum from the Joint Life and Last Survivor Table. At 73 with a 55 year old spouse the period is 32.6 instead of 26.5, which is 18.7 percent lower. On a $500,000 traditional balance the legal minimum is $15,337 rather than $18,868.

TSP does not use that table. TSPBK26 says TSP calculates your RMD from your age, your prior year-end traditional balance and the IRS Uniform Lifetime Table, and if your withdrawals fall short it will automatically send the amount still required. So in that example TSP pays out $18,868, and the extra $3,531 is taxable income that year. The lower figure still matters: the 25 percent excise tax is measured against it. Only the legal minimum is barred from rollover under 26 CFR 1.402(c)-2(f)(1), so the extra may qualify for a 60-day rollover to an IRA; ask a tax adviser before counting on it. The calculator shows both figures and the gap.