RMD at age 79: 4.74% of your balance

How do you calculate your RMD at 79?

Take each account’s balance on December 31 of last year and divide it by 21.1, the IRS factor for 79. On a $500,000 IRA that’s $23,697 for the year — about $1,975 a month if you’d rather spread it out. You can take more, but never less, and the extra doesn’t count toward next year.

1. Find last year’s December 31 balance for every traditional, SEP and SIMPLE IRA, 401(k), 403(b) and 457(b). Leave out Roth IRAs and Roth 401(k) and 403(b) money — they have no RMDs while you’re alive.
2. Use the age you reach on your birthday this year — 79 if you were born in 1947 — even if that birthday is on December 31.
3. Divide by 21.1, the Uniform Lifetime Table factor for 79 (or by the Joint and Last Survivor factor if your spouse qualifies — see below).
4. Withdraw it by the deadline: December 31, or April 1 of next year for a first RMD. You can add up your IRA RMDs and take the total from any one IRA; each 401(k) has to pay its own.

One number worth knowing: after an RMD of 4.74%, your investments have to earn about 5% this year just for the account to end the year where it started. Earn more and next year’s RMD grows; earn less and the account slowly shrinks — exactly what the rules intend.

Will your RMD keep growing at 79?

Probably, in dollars. At 79 you must take 4.74% of the balance; if the account earns more than about 5% after that, it still grows — and next year’s RMD, at 4.95%, grows with it. If returns are weak, the dollar RMD can fall even though the percentage rises.

On a $500,000 account that just breaks even, the RMD goes from $23,697 at 79 to $24,752 at 80. That steady climb is why the late 70s are a good time to decide how you’ll handle RMDs for the next twenty years.

What’s the easiest way to pay the tax on your RMD?

Have federal tax withheld from the RMD itself. The IRS treats withholding as if it were paid evenly through the year, so one December RMD with enough withheld can cover a whole year of tax on your other income too.

That beats quarterly estimated payments: no vouchers, no penalty if you’re late in the year, and you can raise the withholding percentage once you see your total income. If you give to charity, a QCD (below) is even better — that part isn’t taxed at all.

What if your spouse is 15 years younger?

If your spouse is your only beneficiary all year, you use the Joint and Last Survivor Table instead. At 79 with a 64-year-old spouse the factor is 24.7 rather than 21.1, so you must take 4.05% of the balance instead of 4.74%.

Two conditions, both strict: your spouse must be more than 10 years younger and the sole beneficiary of that account for the entire year. Marital status is fixed on January 1, so a divorce or a death during the year changes the table only from the next year. At a gap of exactly 10 years the two tables give the same factor. Try your own ages in the RMD calculator with a younger spouse or the joint-table lookup.

Can a qualified charitable distribution cover your RMD at 79?

Yes. Past age 70½, money sent straight from your IRA to a charity — a qualified charitable distribution (QCD) — counts toward your RMD and never shows up in your taxable income, up to $111,000 per person in 2026. It can cover part of the RMD or all of it.

At 79, that limit covers the entire RMD on any IRA balance up to $2,342,100. A QCD beats taking the RMD and then writing a check: the gift never enters your adjusted gross income, which can keep more of your Social Security untaxed and your Medicare premiums lower — even if you take the standard deduction.

The money must go directly from the IRA to the charity by December 31. It can’t come from a 401(k) — to give from 401(k) money, take that plan’s RMD for the year first (an RMD can’t be rolled over), then roll the rest into an IRA — or from an ongoing SEP or SIMPLE IRA. The IRS has not announced the 2027 limit yet. Not announced yet

Gift on your mind but not sure how much? On $500,000 the whole $23,697 RMD could go to charity; next year at 80 the same balance would require $24,752.