HSA contribution limits for 2026

Yes. Everything put into your HSAs for the year counts toward one limit: what you put in, what your employer puts in, and what anyone else adds for you. That includes what your employer puts in from your pay before tax through a cafeteria plan. With $4,400 as the limit and $1,000 from your employer, you can add $3,400.

Your tax filing deadline, without extensions: April 15, 2027. Money put in early in 2027, up to that day, can count for 2026 if you tell your HSA which year it is for. An employer can do the same, and has to tell you and the HSA.

You need a high-deductible health plan on the first day of the month, no other health coverage (dental, vision, accident, long-term care and telehealth are among the exceptions), not to be enrolled in Medicare, and not to be someone else’s dependent. For 2026, a high-deductible plan has a deductible of at least $1,700 for self-only coverage or $3,400 for family coverage, and caps what you pay out of pocket in the network at $8,500 or $17,000.

Yes, from 2026. Bronze and catastrophic plans count as high-deductible plans for an HSA whether or not they meet the usual deductible test, and whether or not you bought them through an Exchange. A direct primary care membership of up to $150 a month ($300 for more than one person) no longer stops you contributing either. Direct primary care and an HSA.

In the year you turn 55: you need to be 55 or older on the last day of the year. It adds $1,000 to your limit, for $5,400 with self-only coverage or $9,750 with family coverage.

Your limit is worked out month by month: a twelfth of the year’s limit, with the catch-up if you are 55, for each month you were eligible on the first day. The exception is the last-month rule. If you are eligible on December 1, you can put in the whole year’s amount, as long as you stay eligible through December 31 of the next year. If you don’t, for a reason other than death or disability, what the rule let you add goes into your income, with a 10% additional tax.

From the first month you are enrolled in Medicare your limit is zero, so the year’s limit is shared out over the months before. If your Medicare enrollment is backdated, money put in for those months becomes an excess contribution. You can keep spending what is already in the HSA. Paying Medicare premiums from an HSA.

When both of you are eligible and either has family coverage, both are treated as having family coverage, and the family limit, $8,750, is shared: split equally unless you agree on another split. Each spouse needs their own HSA; there are no joint ones. If both of you are 55 or older, each can add $1,000 to their own HSA, for up to $10,750 together.

The excess isn’t deductible, and it owes a 6% excise tax for every year it stays in the account. You avoid that tax by taking out the excess, and what it earned, by your return’s due date including extensions. The earnings are taxed as other income in the year you take them out.

Yes. What you put in yourself, or someone other than your employer puts in for you, comes off your income on Form 8889 whether or not you itemize. What your employer puts in, including from your pay through a cafeteria plan, is left out of your income instead, so it isn’t deducted again.