How much does it take to bridge to the pension?

Stop work before you can reach your pension, and the years in between are paid for from what you can get to: ISAs, savings, a general investment account. Then the pension pays until the State Pension starts. This page works out both stretches for one person, in today’s money, on UK rules.

Your figures

It opens on an example: someone born on 15 June 1986, stopping work at 50 and spending £32,000 a year. Change any of them. Your figures stay in this browser. The sums run on this page; nothing you type is sent to us or kept.

Date of birth

Pension and State Pension ages both depend on it.

Age you would like to stop work

Yearly spending after tax, in today’s money (£)

State Pension forecast, £ a week (optional)

Leave it empty to use the full rate, £241.30 a week in the 2026 to 2027 tax year. A forecast from GOV.UK shows your own figure.

Growth above inflation, % a year

0 counts the money as keeping pace with prices and no more.

Show the stretches if the minimum pension age rose to 58

Not law. The government has said the minimum pension age should stay around 10 years below State Pension age, which rises to 68, but has set no date or rule for a rise to 58.

On these figures

On these figures, stopping work at 50 and spending £32,000 a year takes about £605,600 in today’s money to reach State Pension age at 68, with no growth above inflation: £224,000 before the pension can be reached at 57, and £381,600 in pensions after that.

Before the pension can be reached £224,000 From 50 to 57: 7 years of spending from ISAs, savings and other money you can get to.
From the pension to State Pension age £381,600 From 57 to 68: 11 years, drawn from pensions. About £34,700 a year before Income Tax leaves £32,000.
Both stretches, at the age you stop £605,600
State Pension, from State Pension age £12,548 A year, at the full rate for 35 qualifying years. The other £19,452 a year still comes from savings or pensions.

In today’s money, on 2026/27 rates.

How it is worked out

The first stretch runs from the age you stop to the age the whole of a private pension can be reached: 55 until 5 April 2028, and 57 from 6 April 2028, for your date of birth. Its spending comes from money you can get to.
The second stretch runs from there to your State Pension age, which the law sets by date of birth. Its spending comes from pensions. Part of each withdrawal is tax-free, up to the Lump Sum Allowance (£268,275); the rest is taxed as income, at 2026/27 rates, as if there were no other income.
From State Pension age the State Pension pays part of the spending: £12,548 a year at the full rate, for 35 qualifying years of National Insurance.
Each amount is what the stretch takes at its start, in today’s money. With growth above inflation, the money waiting to be spent earns it, so less is needed.

What it leaves out

One person. A couple can work it out once for each of them.
Spending stays the same every year after inflation.
Investment costs, tax on savings and on a general investment account, and Capital Gains Tax.
Defined benefit pensions and income from work after stopping.
Whether a pension scheme lets money be taken this way. Some schemes have a protected pension age.
It does not say whether a plan is enough: only what the stretches take on these figures.

More on the assumptions behind the app’s own projection: how the retirement figures are worked out.

Questions

When can money be taken from a private pension?

From 55 until 5 April 2028, and from 57 from 6 April 2028. People born between 6 April 1971 and 5 April 1973 are covered by a transitional rule that is still in draft. Some schemes carry a protected pension age.

Source: GOV.UK

What is my State Pension age?

It depends on your date of birth. State Pension age is 68 for anyone born on or after 6 April 1978 under current law. It is reviewed at least every five years, and the government may change the timetable.

Source: GOV.UK

How much is the full new State Pension?

£241.30 a week in the 2026 to 2027 tax year, about £12,548 a year, for 35 or more qualifying years of National Insurance. Fewer years give less. A forecast on GOV.UK shows your own figure.

Source: GOV.UK

Other calculators

Keeping the figures

This page forgets your figures when you leave it. Oxygene Finance runs the same sums on your own pensions, ISAs, savings and property, for one or two people, and keeps them up to date as your figures change. Features and plans shows what is free and what is Premium.

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Oxygene Finance provides information, not financial advice. Figures are estimates based on what you enter and on assumptions you can change. For decisions that matter, a regulated financial adviser or an accountant can look at your whole situation.