A FERS retirement at your Minimum Retirement Age with at least 10 but fewer than 30 years of service. The annuity can start the day you leave, but it is cut by 5% for each year you are under 62, and the cut lasts for life. With 20 or more years, the cut is gone if you start at 60; with fewer, at 62.

Can I postpone an MRA+10 annuity to avoid the cut?

Yes. You can elect in writing to start it later. Each year you wait shrinks the cut by 5%, and starting at 60 with 20 years, or at 62, removes it.

Who gets the FERS supplement?

Someone who retires on an immediate annuity with no age cut before 62: at the MRA with 30 years, or at 60 with 20. It is paid until 62 and roughly stands in for the Social Security earned in federal service. It is not paid on an MRA+10 annuity, postponed or not, or on a deferred annuity. If you earn from work while you get it, an earnings test can reduce it; the calculator does not model that test.

When can I take money from the TSP without the 10% penalty?

If you separate in or after the year you turn 55, TSP withdrawals avoid the 10% additional tax; for federal public safety employees the age is 50. Leave earlier and the TSP is locked until 59½ unless you set up substantially equal payments, as you would for an IRA.

The average of your highest three consecutive years of basic pay, usually your last three. Locality pay counts; overtime and bonuses do not.

FERS early retirement calculator

Leaving federal service before 62 can mean a full annuity, a cut one, or one that waits. Enter when you leave and how long you served to see every route open to you, and what each one pays.

Leaving at 57 with 20 years (MRA+10), starting at once you get

$16,500 a year

That is cut 25% for life, 5% for each year under 62. Postpone the start to 60 and it is $22,000 a year, no cut. Waiting pays back the payments you skip by about age 69. No FERS supplement on an MRA+10 annuity.

Your Minimum Retirement Age: 57
Multiplier: 1% a year
Full annuity, before any cut: $22,000

Year you were bornSets your Minimum Retirement Age.Age you leaveYour age on the day you separate.Years of serviceCreditable service when you leave.High-3 salaryAverage basic pay, best three years in a row.$Social Security at 62 (a month)Optional. From your SSA statement; sizes the supplement.$

Every way to take it

Immediate, unreduced

MRA (57) with 30 years, 60 with 20, or 62 with 5

Not open when you leave at 57 with 20 years.

MRA+10, starting when you leave

Your MRA or later, 10 to 29 years: cut 5% a year under 62

$16,500 a year from 57, cut 25% for life. No supplement.

MRA+10, postponed

Start later by written election; the cut shrinks and ends at 60 with 20 years, or 62

Wait until 60 and it is $22,000 a year, no cut. Any start in between is in the table below.

Deferred

Left before an immediate annuity, 5+ years: unreduced at 62 (60 with 20, MRA with 30)

Starting later is the postponed MRA+10 option above.

Each start age you can choose, from the earliest to the first with no cut. The cut is permanent.
Starts at	Cut	A year
57	25%	$16,500
58	20%	$17,600
59	15%	$18,700
60	none	$22,000

Regular FERS only, before tax, on the high-3 you enter. Not modelled: the survivor benefit reduction, cost-of-living increases, unused sick leave credit, military service buyback, the supplement's earnings test, involuntary or VERA early-out retirement, disability, and the special rules for law enforcement, firefighters and air traffic controllers. For money before 59½ outside the TSP, see the 72(t) calculator. Nothing is stored and nothing is sent to us — the address bar carries your figures so you can save or share them.

The MRA+10 choice: smaller now or full later

For most people who stop work in their fifties, the real decision is when to switch the annuity on. Start the day you leave and every payment is smaller for good. Wait and you skip a few years of income to get a bigger cheque for the rest of your life. The break-even age in the result above is where the bigger cheques have made up the ones you skipped.

Waiting only works if something else pays the bills meanwhile. For a FIRE plan that is usually the TSP or a taxable account. Leave in or after the year you turn 55 and the TSP is open without the 10% penalty. Leave before that and the TSP waits until 59½, so money outside it, or a 72(t) series from an IRA, has to cover the gap.

Why 30 years at your MRA changes everything

Reach your Minimum Retirement Age with 30 years and the annuity starts in full the day you leave, and the FERS supplement is added on top until 62. One year short of 30 and the same exit becomes MRA+10: a cut annuity and no supplement. If you are close, try one more year of service in the calculator and compare.

Your MRA depends on the year you were born: 55 for the earliest birth years, rising in two-month steps to 57 for anyone born in 1970 or later.

Questions people ask

What is MRA+10?: A FERS retirement at your Minimum Retirement Age with at least 10 but fewer than 30 years of service. The annuity can start the day you leave, but it is cut by 5% for each year you are under 62, and the cut lasts for life. With 20 or more years, the cut is gone if you start at 60; with fewer, at 62.
Can I postpone an MRA+10 annuity to avoid the cut?: Yes. You can elect in writing to start it later. Each year you wait shrinks the cut by 5%, and starting at 60 with 20 years, or at 62, removes it.
Who gets the FERS supplement?: Someone who retires on an immediate annuity with no age cut before 62: at the MRA with 30 years, or at 60 with 20. It is paid until 62 and roughly stands in for the Social Security earned in federal service. It is not paid on an MRA+10 annuity, postponed or not, or on a deferred annuity. If you earn from work while you get it, an earnings test can reduce it; the calculator does not model that test.
When can I take money from the TSP without the 10% penalty?: If you separate in or after the year you turn 55, TSP withdrawals avoid the 10% additional tax; for federal public safety employees the age is 50. Leave earlier and the TSP is locked until 59½ unless you set up substantially equal payments, as you would for an IRA.
What is the high-3?: The average of your highest three consecutive years of basic pay, usually your last three. Locality pay counts; overtime and bonuses do not.

To bridge the years before 59½, see the 72(t) calculator and the Roth conversion ladder. For cover before Medicare, see health insurance in early retirement.

Sources: 5 U.S.C. §8412 (eligibility and the Minimum Retirement Age table), §8413 (deferred annuity), §8415 (computation and the age reduction), §8421 (annuity supplement); OPM, FERS eligibility and types of retirement; Internal Revenue Code §72(t)(2)(A)(v) and §72(t)(10).