Income Percentile Calculator by Age

Rank your total income by age range to see what income percentile you are. Find out if you’re in the 1%, to see where you stand today, or  to see where you project yourself to be in the future.

Starting Comparison Age:
Ending Comparison Age:
Income (Annual) : $

Instructions: Simply add up your households annual income, such as your salary, your spouse's salary, bonus, business income, and windfall events, then enter it into the calculator. The age ranges are based off of the age of the head of household, who is typically the primary income earner. The way that the age ranges work is to limit the results to the age groups that you are interested in comparing yourself to, so that the results are more relevant. So for example, if you are 35, I would recommend setting the minimum to 30 and the maximum to 40. The calculator will then update to show only the household incomes of households with heads within that age range.

Income Summary Statistics

Household Ranking:

38.1%
Household Percentile Rank : An income of $52,000 for ages 18 to 100 ranks at the 38.07%
Household Median Income : $70,259
Household Mean Income : $141,390
Household Income 25th - 75th Percentile Ranges : $36,751 to $129,709

Individual Ranking:

69.9%
Individual Percentile Rank : An income of $52,000 for ages 18 to 100 ranks at the 69.88%
Individual Median Income : $29,500
Individual Mean Income : $47,677
Individual Incomes 25th - 75th Percentile Ranges : $10,500 to $59,500

Re-calculate for a different income / age combination.
Continue scrolling to see distribution graphs and additional statistics.

Income Percentiles by Age

50th Percentile (Median) : $70,259
75th Percentile: $129,709
95th Percentile: $390,209
99th Percentile: $1,199,812
I couldn't fit all the ultra-high income 99%+ on this graph, so they're lumped into the last bar.

Income Percentile Stats

  • To be in the top 1% for this age range, your household would need an income of $1,199,812 per year. This would include salary, investments, and any business income. Read more about the households that make up the top 1% by income earnings.
  • To be in the top 5% for this age range, your household would need an income of $390,209 per year. This would include salary, investments, and any business income.
  • Your income of $52,000 for ages 18 to 100 ranks at the 38.07th percentile. Re-enter a different income to find the percentile for that age / income combination.

Income Related Posts

If you’re interested in occupation level income percentiles, you can explore our new calculators. See the full occupation list or explore common occupations such as software developers, CEOs, or cashiers.

In addition, I have created a non-profit CEO income percentile page using data from publicly available IRS 990s. You may also be interested in the net worth percentile calculator.

Income Composition of Households like you versus the Median


Comparisons of Income components of similar households versus median households.
  • Households like you ( weighted using 33.1th to 43.1th percentiles)
  • Versus Households at the Median (weighted using 45th to 55th percentiles)
Income CategorySimilar HouseholdsMedian Households
Total Income:$52,634$70,259
    Wage & Salary Income:$30,209$45,764
    Business Income:$2,704$4,545
    Interest & Dividends:$461$707
    Capital Gains:$418$304
    Retirement Income:$0$0
    Transfers & Welfare:$2,230$2,274
    Other Income:$16,611$16,665

Comparisons of Net Worth, Assets, and Debt components of similar households versus median households.
Asset CategorySimilar HouseholdsHouseholds with Median Incomes
Net Worth:$271,892$429,576
Total Assets:$327,330$521,237
    Financial Assets:$100,744$143,502
    Main House:$174,814$215,414
    Other Assets:$51,772$162,321
Total Debts:$55,438$91,661
    Main Mortgage:$38,500$65,463
    Other Debts:$16,938$26,198
The income and asset compositions are calculated using weighted averages of all the households with-in the specific percentiles. For example, only a portion of the households will own homes, but the asset composition value above for Main House will be averaged across all households still.

Demographics of Comparable Head of Households

Highest Education Level

Race

Labor Force Status

Marriage Status

Table of Income Percentiles for Ages 18 to 100

For reference, here is how much a household would have to earn to rank at certain percentiles between the ages 18 to 100.
PercentileIncome (in Dollars)
90%$248,610
80%$151,328
70%$115,658
60%$90,797
50%$70,259
40%$54,046
30%$43,236
20%$31,346
10%$20,537
Percentiles show the ranking of a particular income result. So a 90% (ninetieth percentile) means that out 100 people the household ranked 90th would have an income of around $248,610.

Visualizing where you stand

Middle 50% by Income Ribbon

This is where your income would rank if there were 100 households within the nation who's head of households were between the ages of 18 to 100. 61 households would be have higher incomes than you. 38 households would have lower incomes than your household.

Common Income Percentile Searches

Income Comparison for Ages 30 to 40
Income Comparison for Ages 30 to 35
Income Comparison for Ages 25 to 30
Income Comparison for Ages 25 to 35
Income Comparison for Ages 40 to 50
Income Rank for $200,000.00
Income Rank for $100,000.00
Income Rank for $150,000.00
Income Rank for $120,000.00
Income Rank for $250,000.00


Share These Results :

Methodology

Household Level Results: These results are based off of 22975 household samples where the head of household was age 18 to 100 and are weighted to represent 131306389 American households. The SCF is known to be slightly biased towards higher incomes values, which the Federal Reserve attempts to correct for by adjusting the weighting of each household response. Keep this in mind if the number of responses your output is based off of is low, or if you are looking at the tail ends of the data--like the top 1% or bottom 1%.The numbers are based off of the results of the 2022 Survey of Consumer Finances by the Federal Reserve. I used R to separate one of the five imputations with the sample replicatant weights from the Federal Reserve.

Individual Level Results: Results that are labeled individual are sourced from the 2017-2021 American Communities Survey and aggregated to the age and nearest $500 income interval to help with web page load speeds. Individuals in your specified age range who reported $0 income are included in this dataset, so these numbers maybe lower than you would expect. Because I have combined two different sources, some of the numbers may not align perfectly.

Updates and News

  • Update: October 2023, I have updated to the 2022 SCF results. The individual income values are based on 2017-2022 ACS results.
  • Update: September 2020, these results now reflect the 2019 SCF. In addition,  I have added individual percentiles based off of the American Communities Survey data.
  • Update: August 2020, I added a new graph of the distribution of income by frequency. The distribution for 99%+ goes really far out, so I have the graph cutting those values off after a little bit to save horizontal space.
  • Update: Jan 2020, I have added some distributions of the source of income for your selected ranges. As well as some additional pages for occupation specific results.  Hopefully this gives you more guidance in what kinds of income are contributing more depending on the income level.
  • Update: April 2019, incomes appear to be growing faster than inflation for the past few years.  If you use this data to compare your current income to the distribution, it will probably be safe to assume that your percentile rank is slightly lower.
  • Update: September 2017, The data is now updated with data from 2016! Median income has risen 10% from 2013 to 2016. Some of the age ranges look a little more irregular than usual, so I will be on the lookout for any additional updates from the Federal Reserve. As of 2/24/2018 there have been no updates to the data that was published. Looking across the data, young adult incomes (adjusted for inflation) have been flat over the past generation, but debt is increasing.

58 thoughts on “Income Percentile Calculator by Age”

  1. Would also be great if you could show a financial asset percentile ranking like the SCF shows (which would include retirement assets too, essentially net worth minus non financial assets/home)

    1. Unfortunately the data gets very noisy on the state level (because it gets split so many ways), so I did not build the calculator to show that.

    1. The 2016 SCF results should be available around summer 2017, so I’ll probably update as soon as it’s available!

        1. The data isn’t available yet. If I remember correctly, the 2013 data was posted around August/September 2014, so I would expect a similar release for 2016 data in August/September of this year.

  2. Should be limited to city/state or region. Numbers are inflated by large cities with higher costs of living.

  3. First and foremost, I enjoy this site-you do an incredible job. But I noticed something unusual for our age group (76-78). The top 90% starting point has doubled based on the $191,388.28 you show on the chart. If you go back to the chart with your 2013 statistics that range starts at around $95,000. I can’t see how my age group’s income could double over the period of 3 years. At this age group people are living on social security, pensions, interest, dividends, and 401K type income. Some might have a part-time job. While their net worth might go up a lot, I don’t see how their income could increase that much. If you still have the 2013 statistics calculator, try it out and see what I mean. I’m wondering if other older age groups might reflect a similar increase for 2016 vs 2013.

    1. Yeah I’m not sure, it might be that the sample size is small and potentially biased. The Treasury usually publishes 1-2 updates after the initial release, so the results may shift.

  4. why does dqydj which also follows the SCF have the top 1% of household income at $400k (as does political calculations) and you have it much higher than that?

    1. Which calculator are you closing of theirs? I was going to look but they have multiple income percentile calculators with different sources and years.

    1. It looks like they’re using a different data source this year. I do remember them having SCF powered calculators. The SCF which powers most of the calculators here does have a notice that they over-sample ultra wealthy households compared to other similar government surveys. Here’s one of the articles they posted in 2008, and most likely the same trend continues in the most recent data https://www.federalreserve.gov/econresdata/scf/files/index_kennickell.html

  5. Happy to rank top 10%! either with just my income alone or household income. we are in our mid 30s. Feels great, as we also rank among the top in your other calculators (net worth by age, savings rate, etc.) but I’m compelled to also share this:
    We make the effort to save at least 40% of our total income (pre tax and post tax). 2018 Goal is to be a 50% saver/investor.
    Bottom line, we believe that high earnings is not just a privilege but a responsibility to be continue to work hard, spend thrift, and have a deep suspicion of consumption.

    Love these calculators – they are informing, inspiring, and motivating all at once.

  6. Wow I thought I was poor. I’m 21 and currently would make $30k per year, but my online business is growing exponentially and may make $100k this year if I can keep it up!!! 🙂 nice to know if I don’t grow anymore I’m still in the top 20% for my age. I also am invested in cryptocurrency which I believe for sure can make a handsome amount of money for my age and I am on my way to be a young millionaire 🙂

  7. If you find a large number of visitors from China recently, it’s not a DDOS attack. This URL is referenced in the WeChat public account of a well-known investment opinion leader.

  8. If you are in retirement and your investments generate a significant portion of your income annually. Do you include that. For example. Social security. 40,000, interest from investments 60,000. Is my income 0, 40,000, or 100,000.

    Love your site. Very accurate

  9. It Should be limited to city/state or region. Numbers are inflated by large cities with higher costs of living. Thanks for sharing this nice and informative article.

  10. Hey,
    I’m wondering why the incomes in the upper range are so high?
    On this calculator, you need $868k+ to be in the top 1%, but on other calculators the cutoff is in the 400k-500k range.

    For example, the IRS data shows that the cutoff for the top 1% is at $515k based on 2017 tax returns.

    1. There’s a lot of literature on the differences, and it’s all very dense: https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-soi/11pwcompench9asource.pdf . I think part of it is there maybe some oversampling in the SCF vs the IRS of high income households. In addition, the IRS $480k value you’re citing is AGI, while the SCF values are gross self reported values, which may have some differences with how people are reporting it on the survey versus how they would report it on taxes. For example, if people have income from businesses, trusts, or other entities that they might lump under their household in the SCF but are split out into a different taxable entity for the IRS.

  11. Great work here!
    I like to use few different calculators (to get more accurate data) and yours fits right in there, based on results.
    I like the breakouts you offer, very helpful!
    Thank you.

    1. In general, wider age ranges (at least 5 years) will give more accurate information for the demographic graphs. Since these results are generated from survey results, some of the data is a little bit clumpy when you look at very small cuts of it. For example, selecting a min and max of 30 will give odd looking results, but selecting 28-32 will give something more reasonable looking.

      I’ve added some logic so that there is a warning that will show up for smaller age ranges.

  12. Are the individual income rankings based on the latest data from 2019 or on an average of the 2014-2018 survveys?

    1. They are still based on 2014-2018, but that’s a good reminder for me to update those.

      EDIT : 3/27/21, I have updated the individual income values and they are now reflective of the 2015-2019 American Communities Survey.

  13. Individual median income is coming up as $3,000 for age range 25-65 and$151,000. This HAS to be wrong. Thanks.

    1. Thank you for the find! I have fixed the issue. When I updated the table for 2015-2019, the data type was changed to character so the sorting was messed up. I apologize for that.

  14. Thank you for including “Individual Ranking” in your calculations. I think it’s a good addition. I do have a little dilemma on what to include as income from rental property in my total income calculation. Should I include gross rental income or net rental income after such expenses as maintenance, property taxes, and insurance etc. Income such as salary and business income seem to be included before taxes and other costs, so should rental income be included before expenses and costs too?

  15. What is “Other Assets”
    Financial Assets I assume are stocks, bonds, currency (including cash & crypto) and retirement accounts. Main house is pretty self explanatory as well… but no idea what would be “other assets… ”

    I guess I dont have secondary homes and rental properties accounted for anywhere but the numbers still seem off (e.g. 25k in other assets for median households). My net worth is about half of “other households with similar income” and while my financial assets and home value are inline with the group, its the “other assets” where I seem to fall short.

  16. Why are the 22 year old percentiles so off from all other age groups through age 34?At income of 771,000 ages 23-34 are 99.99 percentile but age 22 is 94 percentile.

  17. Might be interesting to break down the MSA level income because those of us on the coasts make more, but our comparisons are more against those in our area since the cost of living is substantially higher.

  18. I see the 2022 SCF was released 10/23. When do you anticipate the calculations to reflect the most recent survey?

    1. I had a manual adjustment on the webpage that was causing the number of households to inflate when it loaded the page and has been removed.

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