IRA Calculator

For 2026 the limit is $7,500 across all your IRAs combined, rising to $8,600 from the year you turn 50 thanks to the $1,100 catch-up. For 2025 it was $7,000 and $8,000. The limit is per person, not per account, so opening a second IRA does not raise it, and you cannot contribute more than your taxable compensation for the year.

Because you or your spouse are covered by a retirement plan at work and your modified AGI falls inside the phase-out band. If nobody in the household is covered by a workplace plan, the deduction is not income-limited at all, at any income. Coverage is the trigger; income only matters once coverage applies.

Yes. You can always contribute to a traditional IRA up to the limit regardless of income. A contribution you cannot deduct becomes basis — after-tax money that comes back to you tax free when you withdraw. Only the earnings on it are taxable. You must track that basis on Form 8606, because nobody else will do it for you.

It turns almost entirely on one comparison: your marginal tax rate now against your marginal rate when you withdraw. If the two are the same, and you invest the tax the traditional deduction saves you, the outcomes are mathematically identical. If you expect a lower rate in retirement, the traditional wins; if you expect a higher rate, the Roth wins. Everything else is a second-order effect.

Because otherwise the comparison is unfair. A deductible traditional contribution hands you money back this year that a Roth contribution does not. Ignoring it makes the Roth look better than it is. The figures show the traditional both ways — after tax on its own, and with the up-front saving invested at the same return — so you can decide which matches what you would really do with a refund.

No, and this surprises people. A traditional balance is pre-tax money with a tax bill still attached; a Roth balance is yours outright. At a 24% retirement rate, $100,000 in a traditional IRA is worth about $76,000 in spendable terms. If you enter the same starting balance for both, the Roth will look better by exactly the tax on that old balance and its growth — which is a real difference, not a quirk of the model.

The Roth IRA calculator answers how much you are allowed to put into a Roth, working through the Roth contribution phase-out. This one answers the two traditional-IRA questions: how much of your contribution you can deduct, and which of the two account types leaves you better off after tax. Use them together if you are deciding both how much and where.

It applies one flat marginal rate now and one in retirement, while real withdrawals climb through brackets and interact with how your Social Security is taxed. It assumes a steady annual return, which no market delivers. It ignores state tax, required minimum distributions, early-withdrawal penalties, and the pro-rata rule that applies when you have both pre-tax and after-tax money across your IRAs.