This TSP withdrawal calculator models one payout from the Thrift Savings Plan after you leave federal service. Enter your birth year, the age you separated, your traditional and Roth balances, and the method: fixed dollar installments, installments set by IRS life expectancy tables, a partial distribution, or a total distribution. It returns the gross payment, the taxable part, default federal withholding, any 10% penalty, and your RMD age.
The defaults describe a retiree born in 1964 who left at 60 and starts $2,500 monthly payments in 2026 at 62, holding $400,000 traditional and $100,000 Roth ($60,000 of it contributions). Each check is $2,000 traditional and $500 Roth. Only the $2,000 is taxable, $65.83 is withheld, and $2,434.17 lands in the bank.
TSP Withdrawal Calculator
Model a Thrift Savings Plan installment, partial, or total distribution after you leave federal service: gross payment, the traditional and Roth split, federal withholding, the 10% early penalty, and your RMD age.
Estimates follow the TSP booklets Distributions (9/2026) and Tax Rules about TSP Payments (4/2026), the IRS life expectancy tables, and IRS Pub 15-T for 2026. Withholding is a prepayment, not your final tax. The model covers one payment from a civilian or uniformed services account, not beneficiary accounts, tax-exempt combat pay, the 5-year rule on Roth conversions, or state tax. This is an educational tool, not tax, legal, or financial advice.
What the TSP Withdrawal Calculator Asks and Answers
The Thrift Savings Plan is the retirement savings plan for federal employees and the uniformed services. Under the Federal Employees Retirement System it sits beside the FERS pension and Social Security. Your TSP balance depends on what you saved, your TSP allocation, and investment growth, and the drawdown is your call at any retirement age. We built the math from the plan’s booklets, Distributions (September 2026) and Tax Rules about TSP Payments (April 2026), and checked each figure here against the tool.
Four Distribution Options After You Leave Federal Service
Your TSP savings can stay put as long as the vested amount is at least $200. For income, there are four distribution options, alone or combined, and none can be undone once processed:
- Partial distribution. At least $1,000, allowed even while installments run.
- Total distribution. Everything comes out and installments stop.
- Installments. Monthly, quarterly, or annual: a dollar amount you choose (minimum $25) or one computed from life expectancy.
- Annuity purchase. In the plan’s words, you “purchase a life annuity through our outside vendor.” The minimum is $3,500 per balance.
Fixed Dollar vs Life Expectancy Installments
A fixed installment pays the same amount until you change it or the money runs out. The plan estimates how long that takes from your balance, the payment, and an assumed earnings rate, and that estimate sets the tax category. At a 5% average annual return, $2,500 a month on $500,000 lasts 34.2 years; $6,000 lasts 8.5 years, which changes the withholding. Test a lower TSP growth assumption too.
Life expectancy installments divide the whole balance by the divisor for your age, recalculated each January from the prior year-end balance. Start before your RMD age and the plan uses the Single Life Table; start at or after it and the Uniform Lifetime Table applies. You may switch from the first to the second at RMD age, once.
| Age | Single Life | Uniform Lifetime | Yearly payout on $500,000 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 55 | 31.6 | n/a | $15,822.78 |
| 62 | 25.4 | n/a | $19,685.04 |
| 70 | 18.8 | n/a | $26,595.74 |
| 75 | 14.8 | 24.6 | $20,325.20 (Uniform) |
At 62 the default account pays $19,685.04 a year, $1,640.42 a month. That 3.9% draw sits near the 4% safe withdrawal rule of thumb, and it never empties the account.
Traditional TSP and Roth TSP: The Pro Rata Split
Unless you pick one balance first, every payment is split pro rata between traditional and Roth for tax purposes. With 80% of the account traditional, 80% of each check is pre-tax money. Traditional TSP withdrawals are taxed as ordinary income: contributions, agency matching (free money you already earned), and growth.
The after-tax side mixes contributions or converted amounts, never taxed again, with earnings, always in proportion. Earnings are tax-free only in a qualified payment: 5 years since January 1 of your first Roth TSP contribution, plus age 59 1/2, disability, or death. In the default, $200 of each $500 is earnings, and at 62 with the clock met, none is taxed.
The plan’s own example: $60,000 traditional and $40,000 in Roth TSP balances at age 57. A $1,000 payment is $600 traditional, $150 contributions, and $250 earnings, so $850 is taxable. This tool matches it exactly.
Federal Withholding: 20%, 10%, or the Wage Tables
The tax category of a payment, not its size, sets the default withholding. Nothing is withheld for state tax.
| Payment type | Category | Default | Lower it? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Partial or total distribution | Eligible rollover | 20% | No |
| Fixed installments under 10 years | Eligible rollover | 20% | No |
| Fixed installments 10+ years | Periodic | Wage tables | Yes |
| Life expectancy installments | Periodic | Wage tables | Yes |
| Required minimum distributions | Non-periodic | 10% | Yes |
Many pages claim periodic payments default to 10%. They don’t. Publication 15-T treats you as single: annualize the taxable amount, subtract $8,600, apply the 2026 schedule. For $2,000 taxable a month, that is 10% of the $7,900 above $7,500: $790 a year, $65.83 a month. The $1,640.42 life expectancy check gets $0 withheld. Low withholding isn’t low tax: this income stacks on your pension in your real tax brackets, so sound tax planning means a W-4P that fits your tax situation.
The 20% is mandatory, but a direct rollover to an IRA or other retirement account avoids it.
The Early Withdrawal Penalty, the Age 55 Rule, and Public Safety at 50
Taxable money paid before 59 1/2 normally carries a 10% early withdrawal penalty on top of income tax. The federal retiree exception: none on payments after you separate during or after the year you turn 55. Public safety employees (federal law enforcement, firefighters, air traffic controllers, customs and border protection and corrections officers) get it at 50 or with 25 years of service. Life expectancy installments are exempt too, but stopping them, switching to a fixed amount, or taking extra within five years or before 59 1/2 (whichever is later) makes the penalty retroactive.
Example: born in 1969, 57, taking a $50,000 partial distribution pro rata. The taxable part is $40,000 traditional plus $4,000 of nonqualified earnings, $44,000, and $8,800 is withheld. Left service at 57? No penalty. Left at 53? It costs $4,400.
The rollover trap: the age 55 exception belongs to an employer retirement plan, not IRAs. Move the money to an IRA at 56 and withdrawals there before 59 1/2 are penalized.
RMDs at 73 or 75 and a Sustainable Withdrawal Strategy
Required minimum distributions begin once you have separated and reached 73 (born before 1960) or 75 (born 1960 or later), under SECURE 2.0. The first can wait until April 1 of the next year; later ones are due December 31. The plan uses the traditional balance alone and the Uniform Lifetime Table, and pays any shortfall automatically.
Take the default retiree at 75 in 2039 with the same balances: $400,000 divided by 24.6 is a $16,260.16 RMD. Life expectancy installments on $500,000 pay $20,325.20 that year, with a traditional share of exactly $16,260.16, so pro rata installments cover it. RMDs can’t be rolled over, and the RMD part of a larger distribution is withheld at 10% instead of 20%.
A sustainable withdrawal plan sequences the pieces: TSP payments bridge the years before Social Security, then shrink when the larger checks begin. The calculator helps you test that TSP strategy and a few withdrawal rates against your retirement timeline, and our TSP calculator projects each version’s tax cost.
TSP Annuity or Installments? Fitting the Pieces of Federal Retirement Income
The annuity option trades flexibility for certainty: you give up the money in exchange for guaranteed lifetime monthly payments, and you can’t cancel. The annuity provider sets the annuity payment from your age, the annuity type, and an interest rate index. Use the plan’s TSP annuity calculator to estimate how much monthly life annuity payments could be if you use money in your TSP account to purchase an annuity. Married FERS and uniformed services participants with over $3,500 owe a spouse a joint annuity with a 50% survivor benefit unless the spouse waives it; under CSRS the spouse is only notified.
Installments keep the balance in your TSP funds, such as an L Fund built around a target retirement date. Many retirees split it: a small annuity covers fixed bills with a steady monthly amount, and installments fund the rest. The FERS retirement calculator handles the pension side of retirement income, and our military pay estimate covers related federal retirement pay for BRS members.
Near retirement, change one input at a time and use this calculator to estimate withholding and penalty for each version. Confirm your pick in My Account before you move money from your TSP account. This free TSP withdrawal calculator can help you walk into that request, or a financial advisor’s office, with checked numbers.
Frequently Asked Questions About TSP Withdrawals
How much tax will I owe?
The taxable part adds to your taxable income for the year. Withholding is only a prepayment.
What happens to a TSP loan when I leave?
If you don’t repay it, the unpaid balance is taxed as a distribution and can bring the early penalty.
Do TSP contributions end at separation?
New ones do, but the plan still takes rollovers in, which triggers a new installment calculation.
Last reviewed September 2026 against TSP booklets TSPBK25 (9/2026) and TSPBK26 (4/2026), the IRS 2022 life expectancy tables, and IRS Publication 15-T for 2026. Withholding figures change each January. This page is educational and is not tax, legal, or financial advice.