The Social Security Administration recently announced the upcoming cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) for 2025, and with it comes a slew of changes taking effect next year.

One of those changes is the maximum benefit amount. Starting in 2025, the most you can receive from Social Security is $5,108 per month, up from $4,873 per month in 2024. It’s also significantly higher than the average benefit among retired workers, which is around $1,922 per month, as of September 2024.

There are several requirements you’ll need to meet to earn the maximum payments, and here’s exactly what it takes to snag these checks.

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1. Ensure you’ve worked long enough

You generally only need to work and pay Social Security taxes for 10 years to qualify for retirement benefits. But if you want to maximize your benefit amount, you’ll have to work for at least 35 years before claiming.

Your benefit is based on an average of your earnings throughout the 35 years of your career that you earned the most. There are some other calculations involved in the process, like adjusting your wages for inflation, but in general, the longer you work, the higher your benefit could be.

If you file for Social Security having worked fewer than 35 full years, you’ll have zeros included in your average for each month you were not earning income. That will reduce your benefit and make it impossible to reach the $5,108 monthly maximum.

2. Delay benefits as long as you can

Your earnings history will determine your primary insurance amount, which is how much you’ll receive by filing at your full retirement age (FRA). Your FRA is dependent on your birth year, but it’s 67 years old for everyone born in 1960 or later.

Waiting until your FRA to file will earn you 100% of your earned benefit, but to max out your payments, you’ll need to wait a few more years and file at age 70. While you can technically claim benefits after 70, your payments will not continue to increase beyond that age.

If you were to file at age 67, the maximum possible benefit in 2025 will be only $4,043 per month. Although that’s still a sizable amount, it’s a whopping $1,065 per month less than what you’d receive by waiting just three more years to file.

3. Aim for the earnings limit

The final factor in determining your benefit is your income — specifically, how close you are to the maximum taxable earnings limit.

Every year, the government sets a limit on how much of your earnings can be taxed for Social Security purposes. The closer your income is to this limit, the higher your benefit will be. Once you surpass the cap, that income won’t be subject to Social Security taxes, but it also won’t be factored into your benefit calculations.

Starting in 2025, the maximum taxable earning limit will be $176,100 per year — up from $168,600 per year in 2024. For context, if you began your career 35 years ago in 1990, the limit that year was $51,300 per year. To earn the maximum benefit, you’ll need to have been consistently reaching these limits throughout your career.

Regardless of whether you can reach these benchmarks or not, taking small steps toward increasing your benefit can go a long way. By extending your career by a year or two, delaying benefits even slightly, and trying your best to boost your income, these factors can add up to a bigger monthly payment come retirement.

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