A customer shops at a supermarket in Rockville, Maryland, on July 18, 2025.
Sha Hanting | China News Service | VCG | Getty Images
Social Security beneficiaries may see a 2.7% cost-of-living adjustment in 2026, according to new estimates from policy experts, based on the latest government inflation data.
That projected increase would be higher than the 2.5% adjustment beneficiaries saw in 2025.
Social Security implements a cost-of-living adjustment, or COLA, every year to adjust benefits for inflation. The Social Security Administration typically announces the official change for the upcoming year in October.
New estimates from both Mary Johnson, an independent Social Security and Medicare policy analyst, and the Senior Citizens League, a nonpartisan senior group, point to a 2.7% COLA for 2026, based on new July inflation data.
Two more months of inflation data will be factored into the official COLA calculation for next year.
In July, Johnson estimated a 2.7% Social Security COLA for 2026, and the Senior Citizens League projected 2.6%.
Social Security cost-of-living adjustments have averaged 2.6% over the past 20 years, according to the Senior Citizens League.
How Social Security calculates the COLA
Social Security’s official assessment of the cost of living is based on three months of government inflation data — for July, August and September — which is averaged and compared with the same three months for the previous year. The percentage difference from one year to the next determines the COLA.
The COLA is calculated based on a subset of the consumer price index, the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers, or CPI-W.
The consumer price index was up 2.7% over the past 12 months, according to new July data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Tuesday. The CPI-W was up 2.5% over the last 12 months as of July.
Tariffs had just a modest effect on the latest consumer price index data, though the impact of the new policies did show up in several areas, including household furnishings and supplies.
If tariffs do affect inflation in the next two months, that may have an impact on the Social Security cost-of-living adjustment for 2026.