How to use this calculator
- Choose what you know: the amount to take out, before any tax, or the amount you need in hand, from which the calculator works back to the withdrawal. Then enter it.
- Choose how you’d take it out. While you still work there, the money you put in can come out before 59½ only for a reason the law allows, such as a hardship withdrawal; after you leave, you can take any amount. This decides the withholding, and whether a loan is possible.
- If one applies, choose an exception to the 10% tax, such as leaving the job in or after the year you turned 55 (the rule of 55) or medical bills over 7.5% of your income.
- Enter the tax year, your filing status, your age and your wages, then your vested balance from your plan’s website or statement.
- Under More options, add other income, children, a state rate, and your plan’s loan rate and any loan you owe.
The numbers already filled in are an example. Replace them with your own.
How it’s calculated
The rules come from sections 72(t), 72(p), 402(c) and 3405 of the tax code, their regulations, IRS Publication 575 and the instructions for Form 5329. The calculator figures your federal return twice, with and without the withdrawal, then adds the 10% additional tax and compares both with what is withheld.
The tax it adds
Say you file single for 2026, you’re 40, you earn $75,000 and take $20,000 out of a traditional 401(k) as a hardship withdrawal. Your taxable income rises from $58,900 to $78,900, and your income tax by $4,400. Because you’re under 59½, the 10% additional tax adds $2,000. It comes after your credits, so they can’t reduce it. In all, the withdrawal costs $6,400, and you keep $13,600. Figuring the return rather than multiplying by one rate matters when a withdrawal crosses into a higher tax bracket, or lowers the child tax credit or the earned income credit, which the calculator counts.
What is withheld, and what you’ll owe
A hardship withdrawal has 10% withheld unless you choose another rate on Form W-4R: $2,000 here, so about $4,400 is still owed when you file. A withdrawal you could roll over, such as one after you leave the job, has 20% withheld and you can’t choose less: $4,000 on the same amount. To undo it, you have 60 days to roll the whole $20,000 into an IRA, including the $4,000 withheld, from other money. Roll over only what you received and the withheld part is taxed as a withdrawal, about $1,280.
The exceptions
The 10% doesn’t apply to the part an exception covers. Leaving this employer in or after the year you turn 55 covers all of it while the money stays in the plan: at 56, the same withdrawal after leaving costs $4,400 instead of $6,400. Disability and a terminal illness cover all of it too. Others have limits: medical bills above 7.5% of your income including the withdrawal, $5,000 for each birth or adoption within a year, one emergency withdrawal of up to $1,000 a year, and domestic abuse up to a yearly limit or half your balance. You can claim one on Form 5329 even if your plan doesn’t offer that kind of withdrawal, though the plan then withholds as usual.
Working back from what you need
To have $15,000 in hand after the tax, the example needs a withdrawal of about $22,044: the tax on the extra dollars has to come out of the withdrawal too. The calculator finds the smallest whole-dollar withdrawal that leaves what you need once the tax at filing is paid.
Roth and after-tax money
When part of your 401(k) is Roth or after-tax money, only part of a withdrawal is taxable. Your own contributions come back tax-free in proportion to their share of that money, and only the earnings are taxed, with the 10% before 59½. Say the example’s account holds $20,000 of Roth money ($15,000 of it your contributions) and $10,000 of after-tax money ($8,000 of it contributions). The $20,000 is a hardship withdrawal, so the after-tax money comes out first and the rest from the other two parts in proportion. Then $9,667 of it is tax-free, so the 10% is $1,033 instead of $2,000, and the withdrawal costs $3,299. Roth money comes out with no tax at all once you’re 59½ (or disabled) and five years have passed since January 1 of the year of your first Roth contribution to the plan: at 60, a $10,000 withdrawal of it costs nothing.
The plan reports Roth money on its own Form 1099-R, and it is a separate distribution: to undo the tax within 60 days, its taxable part can go back only into a Roth IRA or another plan’s Roth account. Plans decide which money a withdrawal comes from, so the calculator lets you split it in proportion or set the shares yourself. A hardship withdrawal requires first taking any other money the plan lets you take, such as after-tax money, so in one the calculator takes the after-tax money first. Roth contributions from your pay usually can’t come out while you work there before 59½ except as a hardship.
A 401(k) loan instead
While you still work there, a 401(k) loan can give you the same cash without tax. The law limits it to the lesser of $50,000, lowered by your highest loan balance in the past 12 months, and half your vested balance (or $10,000, if that is more than half; a plan can lend beyond half only against other security, so this calculator uses half). You repay it in level payments over up to five years, with interest that goes back into your account. In the example, borrowing $13,600 at 8.0% costs $275.76 a month, $2,945 of interest in all.
Comparing the two fairly takes the same cash and the same monthly outlay on both sides. The calculator sets the loan’s payments aside after a withdrawal at the same return, then taxes both 401(k) balances and the savings’ growth at the same rate when the money is used. On those terms, borrowing leaves you about $24,941 ahead at 65 in the example. Leaving the job before the loan is repaid changes that: what you still owe is taken from your account and taxed like a withdrawal unless you repay it or roll the same amount into an IRA by your tax return’s due date.
Assumptions and limits
- Roth and after-tax money are split across the withdrawal in proportion to each part’s cash, or as you set them; plans set their own rules. A hardship withdrawal takes after-tax money first. A loan is taken from pre-tax money first. After-tax money and its earnings are treated as their own account; if your plan doesn’t keep them apart, more may be taxable. After-tax contributions made before 1987 and the five-year recapture of an in-plan Roth rollover aren’t included.
- Federal tax on one return for the year you choose. The amount you’ll owe or get back assumes the rest of your income is withheld correctly. A state rate, if you enter one, is a flat rate on the withdrawal; some states add their own early-withdrawal tax, which isn’t included, and state withholding isn’t shown.
- Seven exceptions are figured. Not included: the age-50 rule for firefighters, a series of equal payments, disaster and long-term care withdrawals, reservists, payments to a former spouse under a court order, and death. It assumes you haven’t used the exception you choose before.
- The 10% withholding on a birth or adoption, emergency or domestic abuse amount assumes your plan pays it as that kind of withdrawal; if it pays a regular one after you leave, 20% is withheld on all of it.
- Children under 17 also count for the earned income credit, and older qualifying children aren’t asked for. On a joint return your spouse is assumed to be at least 25 for the credit’s age test. With three or more children, the extra refundable child tax credit figured from the Social Security and Medicare tax you paid (Schedule 8812, Part II-B) isn’t figured; it can matter only with very low earnings.
- Adjustments are used as entered. A deductible IRA contribution and student loan interest, which shrink as income rises, aren’t modeled, so the withdrawal may add a little more tax than shown. The premium tax credit for Marketplace coverage, which a withdrawal can reduce, isn’t priced.
- The account grows at the return you enter, compounded monthly, with no fees, and your regular contributions are left out because they’re the same on every line, except any you say you’d stop while repaying.
- The loan is priced only while you still work for the employer, with monthly payments at a fixed rate repaid on schedule. Its limit uses half your vested balance; the law can allow up to $10,000 when half is less, if your plan accepts other security. A loan to buy your main home can run longer than five years; that isn’t modeled.
- The comparison taxes the 401(k) and the savings’ growth once, at one rate, when the money is used. Yearly tax on interest and dividends, or a lower rate on long-term gains, would change it.
- Ages run to 71, so no required minimum distribution falls in the year.
Input field details
What to enter in each box, where to find the number, and how this calculator treats it. When two calculators give different answers from the same numbers, it's usually because they handle one of these differently.
Amount to take out
The amount you would ask the plan to pay out, before any tax is withheld.
Where to find itYour plan’s website or withdrawal form; the gross amount later appears in box 1 of the Form 1099-R the plan sends you.
How this tool treats itMoney taken out of a 401(k) before you reach 59½ is an early distribution. All of it is taxed as ordinary income in the year you take it, and unless an exception applies it also carries a 10% additional tax. The tool figures your federal return with and without the withdrawal, so the tax it shows is what the withdrawal adds at your income, not a flat rate. A withdrawal larger than your vested balance less any loan you owe is read as that amount, the cash the account holds.
Allowed range$0 to $5,000,000
Not includedRoth 401(k) money and after-tax contributions, which come out partly tax-free.
What you know
Choose “The amount I need in hand” if you know how much cash you need after tax, and enter that amount.
How this tool treats itThe tool then finds the smallest whole-dollar withdrawal that leaves at least that much once the federal tax it adds, the 10% additional tax and any state rate you entered are paid, so you know what to ask the plan for. A hardship withdrawal may include the taxes the withdrawal itself causes. If even all the cash in your account leaves less than you need, the tool says so and uses all of it.
Allowed range$0 to $5,000,000
How you’d take it out
A hardship withdrawal while you still work for the employer, a withdrawal from the plan of a job you have left, or another withdrawal the plan allows while you still work there.
Where to find itYour plan’s summary plan description or website lists which withdrawals it offers while you are employed.
How this tool treats itA hardship withdrawal is for an immediate and heavy financial need, such as medical bills, avoiding eviction or foreclosure, funeral costs or tuition, and is limited to the amount of the need, which may include the tax it causes. It cannot be rolled over, so the plan withholds 10% unless you choose another rate. Most other withdrawals, including money from a job you have left, are eligible rollover distributions: you could move them to an IRA or another plan, so the plan must withhold 20% of any amount paid to you. Taking a hardship withdrawal does not stop you contributing to the plan. A loan is offered only while you still work for the employer.
An exception to the 10% tax
The exception that applies to you, if any. For medical bills, enter the year’s unreimbursed bills; for a birth or adoption, the number of children.
Where to find itYour own records: medical bills not paid by insurance, a birth or adoption date, a doctor’s certification for a disability or terminal illness.
How this tool treats itThe 10% additional tax applies to the taxable part of a withdrawal before 59½ and is added after your credits, so no credit reduces it. Its exceptions for a 401(k): you left this employer in or after the year you turned 55, so you are at least 54 when you take the money; total and permanent disability; a terminal illness a doctor certifies as expected to end in death within 84 months; medical bills over 7.5% of your adjusted gross income, counting the withdrawal itself, whether or not you itemize; up to $5,000 for each child born or adopted within the past year; one emergency withdrawal of up to $1,000 a calendar year; and a withdrawal within a year of domestic abuse, up to the year’s limit or half your vested balance if less. The age-55 rule covers only money left in this plan: roll it to an IRA and it is lost. The birth, emergency and domestic abuse withdrawals can be paid back within three years. If your plan does not offer one of these kinds of withdrawal (or a terminal illness one), you can still claim the exception on Form 5329 for another withdrawal you are allowed to take, but the plan then withholds as it would on that withdrawal. The tool assumes you have not used the exception before: one emergency withdrawal a year, and the domestic abuse limit is a total.
Allowed rangeMedical bills $0 to $5,000,000; 1 to 10 children
Not includedDeath, a series of substantially equal payments, a payment under a divorce order (QDRO), an IRS levy, qualified reservists, disaster recovery and long-term care distributions, withdrawals from an automatic-enrollment arrangement, emergency savings account distributions, corrective distributions, and the age-50 rule for private-sector firefighters. Higher education, a first home and health insurance while unemployed are exceptions for IRAs only, not for a 401(k).
Filing status
The status you will file under for the year you take the money out.
Where to find itLast year’s Form 1040, top of page 1, unless your situation has changed.
How this tool treats itA separate return is figured as if you lived with your spouse during the year, which makes up to 85% of any Social Security benefits taxable.
Your age when you take it out
Your age on the day the money comes out. At 59, say whether you will have reached 59½ by then.
How this tool treats itThe 10% additional tax stops on the day you reach 59½, which is six months after your 59th birthday, not on January 1 of any year. At 60 or older it never applies. Your age also decides the age-65 standard deduction and the senior deduction from 65, and the earned income credit’s age test for someone with no qualifying child (25 or older, and not 65 by December 31). The range stops at 71, so no required minimum distribution falls in the year.
Allowed range18 to 71
Your wages this year
Your wages for the year the money comes out, and on a joint return your spouse’s.
Where to find itForm W-2, box 1, or your year-to-date pay plus what you expect for the rest of the year.
How this tool treats itBox 1 wages are after pre-tax 401(k) and similar contributions. They set where the withdrawal lands in your brackets, and they are the earned income for the child tax credit and the earned income credit.
Allowed range$0 to $10,000,000 each
Your vested 401(k) balance
The part of your 401(k) you would keep if you left the employer today, including any loan you owe it.
Where to find itYour plan’s website or quarterly statement, usually labeled “vested balance”.
How this tool treats itYour own contributions are always fully vested; employer contributions may vest over several years. A loan you owe the plan counts as part of the vested balance, as the loan limit counts it, but is not cash the plan can pay out, so the withdrawal is capped at the balance less the loan. The vested balance also sets the loan limit and two exceptions’ limits, and starts the growth comparison. Only pre-tax money is assumed.
Allowed range$0 to $10,000,000
Expected yearly return
The yearly return you expect on the 401(k) before fees.
How this tool treats itMoney you take out stops growing, and that lost growth is the withdrawal’s opportunity cost. The tool compounds the return monthly, rounded to the cent each month, and shows the lost growth by age, never added to this year’s tax. Returns are an assumption, not a forecast.
Allowed range0% to 20%
Loan interest rate and term
The rate and the number of years from your plan’s loan terms.
Where to find itYour plan’s loan policy or its website’s loan modeler. The starting rate here is the prime rate plus one point, an illustration only: plans set their own rates.
How this tool treats itA 401(k) loan borrows from your own account: no tax is due if you repay it on schedule, and the interest you pay goes back into your account. It must be repaid in level payments at least quarterly within five years; the tool uses monthly payments starting a month after the loan. The interest is not deductible.
Allowed range0% to 20%; 1 to 5 years
Not includedA loan to buy your main home, which may run longer than five years.
Loans you owe now and in the past year
What you owe on loans from this plan today, and the highest balance you owed on them at any time in the past 12 months.
Where to find itYour plan’s loan statements or website.
How this tool treats itThe law caps all your loans from the plan at the lesser of $50,000, reduced by how much your highest balance in the past 12 months exceeds what you owe now, or half your vested balance, and what you owe now comes off that. A balance owed now above the highest you entered is read as the highest, and one above your vested balance as the vested balance. The statute allows up to $10,000 where half your balance is less, but a plan may take at most half your vested balance as security, so the tool does not use that floor. Your plan’s own limit may be lower, and a plan does not have to offer loans.
Allowed range$0 to $50,000 each
If you left the job after
A number of months after taking the loan, to see what happens if you leave the employer then.
How this tool treats itIf you leave with a balance owed, the plan usually takes it from your account: a loan offset. You can avoid the tax by putting that amount into an IRA or another plan by your tax return’s due date, extensions included. Otherwise it is taxed as a withdrawal, with the 10% additional tax unless you are 55 or older then, or disabled or terminally ill. Nothing is withheld from an offset, so all of its tax is owed when you file. The tool uses this year’s tax figures, your same income, and your age now plus the whole years until you leave.
Allowed range1 to 60 months
Not includedA deemed distribution: missing loan payments while still employed can make the balance taxable with no money paid to you.
Contributions you’d stop while repaying
How much a month you would stop putting in while you repay the loan, including any employer match you would lose.
Where to find itYour pay stub (your 401(k) deduction) and your plan’s matching formula.
How this tool treats itThe tool shows how much smaller your 401(k) would be at the compare age as its own line. It is not part of the loan-versus-withdrawal comparison, which assumes both keep contributing alike.
Allowed range$0 to $10,000 a month
Federal withholding
Leave the plan’s default, or enter the rate you chose on Form W-4R.
Where to find itThe Form W-4R you give the plan with your request, or the withholding shown on its confirmation.
How this tool treats itA withdrawal you could roll over has mandatory 20% withholding: you can choose more on Form W-4R but not less. A hardship withdrawal and a birth, emergency or domestic abuse withdrawal default to 10%, and you can choose any rate from 0% to 100%. Nothing is withheld from a rollover-eligible withdrawal under $200 in the year. Withholding is a prepayment; your return decides the tax, so the tool shows what you will still owe or get back. To undo a withdrawal you could roll over, put the whole amount, including what was withheld, into an IRA or plan within 60 days.
Allowed range0% to 100%
State income tax rate on it
A flat state income tax rate to apply to the withdrawal, or 0 to leave state tax out.
How this tool treats itApplied to the whole withdrawal only. Some states add their own tax on early withdrawals, which is not included, and the plan may withhold state tax, which is not shown.
Allowed range0% to 15%
Investment income
Taxable interest and nonqualified dividends; separately, qualified dividends and long-term capital gains.
Where to find itThis year’s 1099 forms, or last year’s Form 1040 as a guide: lines 2b and 3b for interest and ordinary dividends, lines 3a and 7 for qualified dividends and gains.
How this tool treats itThe withdrawal is not investment income, but by raising your income it can add the 3.8% net investment income tax on these amounts, and push qualified dividends and gains from the 0% rate to 15%. These amounts also count toward the earned income credit’s investment income limit.
Allowed range$0 to $10,000,000 each
Other taxable income
Other income taxed like wages: unemployment pay, a pension, or self-employment profit after its own adjustments.
How this tool treats itAdded to your ordinary income. It is not investment income, so it does not count toward the net investment income tax or the earned income credit’s investment income limit. Self-employment tax is not figured here.
Allowed range$0 to $10,000,000
Social Security benefits this year
The year’s total Social Security benefits.
Where to find itForm SSA-1099, box 5.
How this tool treats itA withdrawal can make more of your benefits taxable, which the tax it adds includes.
Allowed range$0 to $500,000
HSA and other adjustments, and itemized deductions
Adjustments to income that do not shrink as income rises, such as HSA contributions and educator expenses, and your itemized deductions if you itemize.
Where to find itSchedule 1 (Form 1040), Part II, and Schedule A, from last year as a guide.
How this tool treats itThe larger of your itemized deductions and the standard deduction is used. Adjustments and itemized deductions are taken as entered and do not change with the withdrawal. A deductible IRA contribution and student loan interest shrink as income rises and are not modeled, so the withdrawal may add a little more tax than shown when you have them.
Allowed range$0 to $1,000,000 of adjustments; $0 to $10,000,000 itemized
Children and other dependents
Children under 17 you claim, and any other dependents.
How this tool treats itChildren under 17 count for the child tax credit and as qualifying children for the earned income credit. A withdrawal can reduce either credit, which is part of the tax it adds.
Allowed range0 to 10 each
65 or older
At 64, tick if you were born before January 2 of the year the label shows (the tax year minus 64): that makes you 65 by the end of the tax year. On a joint return, tick if your spouse is 65 or older at the end of the year.
How this tool treats itThe IRS counts you as 65 on the day before your 65th birthday, so someone born on January 1 is 65 for the year before. It adds to the standard deduction and, for 2025 through 2028, brings the senior deduction of up to $6,000 a person, reduced as income rises, so a withdrawal can shrink it.
Compare at age, and your later tax rate
The age at which you would use the money, and the tax rate you expect to pay when you take it out then.
How this tool treats itBoth choices get the same cash today. The borrower repays the loan from pay; the tool sets the same monthly payments aside for the withdrawer, growing at the same return. Each 401(k), and the growth on the savings, is then taxed once at the later rate, by default the rate this withdrawal costs in income tax and state tax (from 0% to 60%). Yearly tax on interest and dividends, or a lower rate on long-term gains, would change the result. The 10% is not applied later. An age at or below your age now is read as one year later.
Allowed rangeAge 19 to 98; 0% to 60%
Roth money in your 401(k)
How much of your vested balance is in a Roth 401(k) account in this plan, how much of that you put in yourself, and the year of your first Roth contribution to this plan.
Where to find itYour plan’s statement or website, which shows the Roth source separately. A Form 1099-R for an earlier Roth distribution shows the first year in box 11.
How this tool treats itA Roth withdrawal is a qualified distribution, with no tax at all, once you are 59½ (or disabled) and five years have passed since January 1 of the year of your first Roth contribution to this plan. Otherwise your contributions come out tax-free in proportion and the earnings are taxed, with the 10% before 59½. Roth money moved in by a direct rollover from another plan keeps that plan’s earlier year; money rolled over within 60 days does not. A year after the tax year is read as the tax year.
Allowed range$0 to $10,000,000; years 2006 to 2026
Not includedThe five-year recapture of an in-plan Roth rollover, and a beneficiary’s withdrawal.
After-tax money in your 401(k)
How much of your vested balance comes from after-tax contributions that are not Roth, with their earnings, and how much of that you put in.
Where to find itYour plan’s statement, where after-tax contributions are a separate source from pre-tax and Roth money.
How this tool treats itYour after-tax contributions come out tax-free in proportion and their earnings are taxed. The tool treats this money and its earnings as their own account, which the tax law allows a plan to do; if your plan does not, more of a withdrawal may be taxable.
Allowed range$0 to $10,000,000
Not includedAfter-tax contributions made before 1987, which can come out first.
How the withdrawal is split
In proportion to each part’s cash, or the shares you set: the part from Roth money and the part from after-tax money, the rest from pre-tax money.
Where to find itYour plan’s withdrawal rules or its withdrawal form.
How this tool treats itPlans differ. A hardship withdrawal comes after any after-tax money you can take, so that part counts as an ordinary withdrawal. Roth contributions from your pay usually cannot come out while you work there before 59½ except as a hardship, so an in-proportion withdrawal of that kind leaves Roth money out. A share larger than what is left after the Roth share is reduced to fit. A loan is taken from pre-tax money first, then after-tax, then Roth.
Allowed range0% to 100% each
Premium tax credit
Tick if you get a premium tax credit for health insurance bought through the Marketplace.
How this tool treats itThe withdrawal raises the income the credit is figured on, so the credit may shrink, and in 2026 there is no credit above 400% of the poverty line. The tool notes this but does not price it.
Today’s dollars
Tick to show future amounts in today’s dollars, and set the inflation rate.
How this tool treats itEach future amount is divided by one plus inflation for each whole year ahead. The comparison’s result does not change, only how it is shown.
Allowed range0% to 10%
Questions
Is the 10% penalty on the whole withdrawal?
How is a withdrawal from a Roth 401(k) taxed?
Why was only 10% (or 20%) withheld when I owe more?
Which exceptions to the 10% don’t apply to a 401(k)?
Does the age-55 rule still apply if I roll the money into an IRA?
Is a 401(k) loan better than a withdrawal?
What happens to my 401(k) loan if I leave my job?
Can I put the money back?
Do I need Form 5329?
Version history
- October 13, 2026 (version 1.0.0): First version: the federal tax and 10% additional tax on a 401(k) withdrawal before 59½, its exceptions, Roth and after-tax money, the withholding and what you'll owe at filing, and a 401(k) loan compared, for 2025 or 2026.