IRMAA brackets for 2028
CMS has not published the 2028 MAGI brackets. Pages printing a single 2028 threshold are applying an assumed inflation rate. The statutory calculation needs a CPI-U figure BLS has not released. Below is what is known, what is missing, and when the figures are due.
What is known today
| Item | Status | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Income that counts | Still open | Your 2026 MAGI — the year you are in now, so still changeable |
| Part D national base premium | Not published | Due mid-2027 |
| Top-tier floors | Now indexed | Unlike 2027, the $500,000 and $750,000 top-tier floors DO become indexed for years beginning after 2027, so 2028 is the first year they can move. |
| MAGI thresholds | Not published | Expected October-November 2027 |
| Standard Part B premium | Not published | Same release |
| Part B and Part D IRMAA amounts | Not published | Same release |
CMS has published nothing at all for 2028 yet. Even the Part D national average bid, which lands mid-year, is not due until 2027.
When CMS publishes the 2028 figures
CMS does not announce the date in advance, so the honest answer is the record of when it has actually done it. Each year’s figures arrive in a Medicare Parts B and D fact sheet published the autumn before the plan year begins.
| Plan year | CMS published the figures | Fact sheet |
|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 27 September 2022 | CMS newsroom |
| 2024 | 12 October 2023 | CMS newsroom |
| 2025 | 8 November 2024 | CMS newsroom |
| 2026 | 14 November 2025 | CMS newsroom |
| 2028 | Not published | Due in the autumn of 2027 |
The date has moved later every year in that record — from 27 September 2022 for 2023 to 14 November 2025 for 2026, a drift of 48 days across four releases. On that pattern the 2028 figures are a November 2027 release rather than a September or October one, though CMS is under no obligation to follow it and a year that breaks the pattern would not be surprising.
Two practical consequences. Anyone planning a 2026 income decision around the 2028 thresholds is working from figures that will not exist until late in 2027, by which time the income year that sets them is already closed. And a page showing a 2028 threshold today is showing an assumption, whoever publishes it — the section below explains why no one can compute the statutory figure yet.
What the statutory calculation still needs
The MAGI thresholds are indexed under Social Security Act §1839(i)(5), 42 U.S.C. §1395r(i)(5) using the Consumer Price Index for all urban consumers (CPI-U), United States city average, measured over the 12-month period ending with August of the preceding calendar year, versus the 12-month period ending with August 2018 (for years beginning with 2020).
For 2028 that means the 12-month average ending August 2027. BLS publishes the August figure around mid-September 2027. Until then the final input to the formula does not exist, so an exact 2028 threshold cannot be computed by us, by CMS, or by any site publishing one.
Published 2028 figures differ for that reason. Across pages ranking for this query, the first single-filer threshold is given variously as $109,000, $111,000, $112,000 and $113,000, and the joint figure as $222,000, $224,000 and $226,000. Each implies a different inflation assumption.
When BLS publishes the August 2027 CPI-U, the statutory average becomes computable and we will publish it here with every input shown. When CMS releases the official 2028 figures in October-November 2027, this page becomes the official table, dated and sourced.
Illustrative range — not CMS figures
What the 2026 thresholds would come to at a few rates of increase. For scale, the thresholds actually rose 2.83% from 2025 to 2026 ($106,000 → $109,000 single).
Two years of unknown inflation sit between the published 2026 figures and 2028, so these are wider bounds than a projection - they show what a sustained rate would produce, not what will happen. The top-tier floors are shown moving because they become indexed for 2028; for 2027 they do not.
| Tier | 2026 single (official) | at +0% not CMS | at +2% not CMS | at +3% not CMS | at +5% not CMS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Standard | $109,000 | $109,000 | $111,000 | $112,000 | $114,000 |
| Tier 1 | $137,000 | $137,000 | $140,000 | $141,000 | $144,000 |
| Tier 2 | $171,000 | $171,000 | $174,000 | $176,000 | $180,000 |
| Tier 3 | $205,000 | $205,000 | $209,000 | $211,000 | $215,000 |
| Tier 4 | $500,000 | $500,000 | $510,000 | $515,000 | $525,000 |
| Top tier | $500,000 | $500,000 | $510,000 | $515,000 | $525,000 |
Joint thresholds are double the single figures at every tier except the top. Unlike 2027, the $500,000 and $750,000 top-tier floors DO become indexed for years beginning after 2027, so 2028 is the first year they can move. The married-filing-separately floor moved DOWN from $394,000 (2025) to $391,000 (2026), so it does not track the same index as the other lines. We do not project it.
Which tax year sets the 2028 surcharge
The 2028 surcharge will be set by 2026 MAGI, under the two-year lookback. That return has not been filed yet.
A Roth conversion, property sale, inherited IRA withdrawal or capital gain booked before 31 December falls in 2026 MAGI, and so in the 2028bracket.
The 2028 thresholds are unpublished, so there is no exact line to measure against. The mechanism is fixed and the 2026 lines are the nearest published reference; the 2026 table gives the cost of crossing each one.
If your income has since dropped because of a life-changing event — retirement, a spouse’s death, divorce, loss of a pension — you may be able to have the surcharge reduced using Form SSA-44, rather than waiting for the lookback to move to a later tax year. How that works.