The Inherited IRA 10-Year Rule: RMDs and Tax Impact in 2026

If you inherited an IRA from someone other than your spouse, the rules that govern it changed fundamentally with the SECURE Act, and the final pieces only took full effect recently. For deaths in 2020 or later, most non-spouse beneficiaries can no longer stretch withdrawals across their lifetime. The account has to be emptied within 10 years.

That much has been clear for a while. What was genuinely confusing — for beneficiaries and advisors alike — was whether you had to take annual withdrawals during those 10 years, or whether you could let the account sit and pull everything out at the end. The IRS went back and forth, waived the requirement for several years, and only finalized its position in July 2024. 2025 was the first year the annual requirement was actually enforced with penalties — the first hard deadline fell on December 31, 2025.

The deadline itself is not the hard part. The hard part is the tax. A 10-year payout window is also a 10-year span of added taxable income, and how you spread it determines whether you pay at your normal rate or push yourself into a higher bracket — and into IRMAA surcharges and other income-driven costs. That is the question worth modeling before you take a single distribution.

Quick test: do you owe annual inherited IRA RMDs?

The rules branch quickly, so before the definitions, here is the short version. Work through these in order:

1. Did you inherit from a spouse? Spouses have special options, including treating the IRA as their own. The 10-year rule is usually not the right framework — see a custodian or advisor about a spousal rollover.
2. Are you an eligible designated beneficiary? A surviving spouse, a minor child of the owner, a disabled or chronically ill individual, or someone not more than 10 years younger than the owner may be able to stretch distributions over their life expectancy instead of using the 10-year cleanout.
3. Everyone else (most adult children and other heirs): the 10-year rule applies. Whether you also owe annual RMDs in years 1–9 depends on one fact — did the original owner die before or after their required beginning date?
4. Did the owner die on or after their RBD? If yes, you generally must take annual RMDs in years 1–9 and empty the account by year 10. If the owner died before their RBD, no annual RMDs are required — but the account must still be empty by year 10.
5. Is it an inherited Roth IRA? No annual RMDs during the 10 years, and qualified distributions are tax-free — but the year-10 cleanout still applies.

That fourth point — before versus after the RBD — is the distinction that caused years of confusion, and it is the one that matters most now. The rest of this article walks through each branch in detail.

First, which kind of beneficiary are you?

Before you calculate anything, identify the beneficiary type — that answer determines whether you can stretch, must empty the account in 10 years, or face a 5-year rule. The SECURE Act sorts inherited-account beneficiaries into three groups, and the differences between them are large.

Eligible designated beneficiaries (EDBs) — exempt from the 10-year rule

Five categories of beneficiary are still permitted to stretch distributions over their life expectancy, the way nearly everyone could before the SECURE Act:

• •A surviving spouse — who also has the option to roll the IRA into their own account
• •A minor child of the original owner — but only until age 21, at which point the 10-year clock starts
• •A disabled individual — meeting the IRS definition of disability
• •A chronically ill individual — within the meaning of the tax code
• •A beneficiary not more than 10 years younger than the original owner — often a sibling or a partner close in age

Non-eligible designated beneficiaries (NEDBs) — subject to the 10-year rule

This is the category most people fall into: an adult child, a grandchild, a niece or nephew, a friend — any named individual who is not an EDB. If this is you, the inherited account must be fully distributed by December 31 of the tenth year after the year of death. Whether you also owe annual RMDs along the way depends on one specific fact, covered in the next section.

Non-designated beneficiaries — the 5-year rule

This is where things get messy if the estate planning wasn't clean. Estates, charities, and most trusts have no life expectancy of their own. If the owner died before their required beginning date, these beneficiaries generally face a 5-year cleanout rather than 10. If the owner died on or after their RBD, the account instead pays out over the decedent's remaining single life expectancy (the “ghost life expectancy” rule), which for a younger decedent can run longer than 10 years. (Certain qualifying “see-through” trusts can be treated as designated beneficiaries — a detail worth reviewing with an estate attorney if a trust is named.)

Beneficiary types at a glance

The question that determines everything: did the owner die before or after their RBD?

If you are a non-eligible designated beneficiary subject to the 10-year rule, there is one more fork that decides whether you must take annual withdrawals or can wait until the end. It hinges on the original owner's required beginning date (RBD) — generally April 1 of the year after they reached their applicable RMD age, currently 73 for many IRA owners (rising to 75 for those born in 1960 or later).

If the owner died before their RBD

You have full flexibility within the 10-year window. No annual RMDs are required. You can take nothing for nine years and empty the account in year 10, spread it evenly, or skip around — as long as the balance reaches zero by the end of the tenth year. The only constraint is the final deadline.

If the owner died on or after their RBD

This is where the 2024 final regulations landed, after years of uncertainty. Because the original owner had already started taking RMDs, you must continue taking annual RMDs in years 1 through 9 — and empty the account by the end of year 10. The annual amount is based on your own life expectancy, not the original owner's.

Inherited Roth IRAs work differently

If you inherited a Roth IRA, the 10-year cleanout still applies for non-eligible designated beneficiaries — the account must be emptied by the end of year 10. But there are no annual RMDs during the 10 years, because a Roth owner is never considered to have a required beginning date. And qualified distributions from an inherited Roth are tax-free.

That combination — tax-free, no annual requirement, hard deadline at year 10 — usually points to a clear strategy: leave the money invested as long as possible and take it all near the end, letting it grow tax-free for the full decade. The opposite of the traditional-IRA instinct.

The tax impact is the part that actually costs you

For a traditional inherited IRA, every dollar you withdraw is ordinary income in the year you take it. The 10-year rule is really a 10-year window to manage that income — and the difference between managing it well and badly can be tens of thousands of dollars.

Think about it this way: an heir in their peak earning years who waits until year 10 and pulls out a large balance in a single year can push that entire distribution into the top of their bracket — and trigger IRMAA Medicare surcharges and a higher rate on the rest of their income. (The distribution itself isn't subject to the 3.8% net investment income tax — retirement-account withdrawals are excluded — but the higher income it creates can pull other investment income, like dividends and capital gains, above the NIIT threshold.) Spreading the same balance across all 10 years often keeps each year's distribution in a lower bracket.

A worked example: spike versus spread

Consider an heir who inherits a $400,000 traditional IRA, is subject to the 10-year rule, and is in a household with $150,000 of other taxable income.

The total amount withdrawn is identical. The difference is whether the inheritance lands on top of a single year's income or is spread across ten tax years. Waiting turns the inheritance into one large tax event; spreading turns it into a planning schedule. Filling up lower brackets each year — rather than letting the balance balloon and forcing a single large taxable event — is the core planning move. The optimal path depends on your other income, how it is expected to change over the decade, your proximity to bracket and IRMAA thresholds, and whether you expect to retire partway through the window.

Model the 10-year drawdown before you take a dollar

RetireSmartIRA compares inherited IRA drawdown schedules year by year

See how each choice affects your tax brackets, IRMAA exposure, and after-tax wealth before you take the distribution. Available on iPhone, iPad, and Mac. Free through 2026.

What to do now, depending on your situation

What to do if you missed your 2025 inherited IRA RMD

You likely owe an annual RMD for 2026 as well. Confirm the amount with your custodian or by calculating it from your own life expectancy, and take it before December 31 to avoid the penalty. Then model the remaining years so the required minimums plus any additional voluntary withdrawals add up to a tax-smart path to zero by year 10.

If you inherited a few years ago and skipped the waived RMDs

You owe nothing for 2021–2024 and don't have to make those up. But your 10-year deadline has not moved, so the remaining balance now has fewer years to come out. Map the remaining schedule deliberately — the compression can push you toward larger annual distributions than you'd expect.

If you inherited a Roth, or the owner died before their RBD

You have flexibility. For an inherited Roth, letting it grow tax-free and taking it near year 10 is often optimal. For a traditional IRA where the owner died before their RBD, you still have no annual requirement — but the tax-spreading logic still applies, so don't default to waiting if a level drawdown would keep you in lower brackets.

If you are 70½ or older, consider a QCD from the inherited IRA

This is a planning move many beneficiaries miss. If you are 70½ or older, you can make a qualified charitable distribution (QCD) directly from an inherited traditional IRA — and it counts toward that year's required distribution while staying out of your AGI. In 2026 the limit is $111,000 per person, indexed for inflation. For a charitably inclined beneficiary, that satisfies the RMD, reduces taxable income, and — because it keeps the distribution out of MAGI — can also help avoid pushing yourself into a higher IRMAA tier two years later. The QCD must go directly from the custodian to the charity.

The deadline is fixed. The tax is a choice.

The 10-year rule removed a lot of flexibility, but it left the one decision that matters most: how to spread the income. That choice is yours to make, and it is knowable in advance. The beneficiaries who handle this well are the ones who map the full decade before taking the first distribution — not the ones who wait until year 10 and discover the bracket they landed in.