The detail
The Retirement Living Standards are about more than just the figures. They’re designed to help you picture what your life in retirement could look like.
They reflect everyday choices and needs, such as your home comforts, getting out and about, the holidays you take, and how much you can spend on family or activities.
Everyone’s situation is different. You’re unlikely to spend exactly these amounts, but they give you a useful guide to help you plan for your own retirement.
Once you have a sense of the lifestyle you want, you can think about the income you’ll need to support it, including your State Pension and any pensions, savings or other investments.
Housing costs and the Retirement Living Standards
Some household costs, such as household bills and basic maintenance, are already included in the Retirement Living Standards.
However, rent and mortgage payments are not included. This reflects the expectation that many people will own their home outright in retirement, although this won’t apply to everyone and an increasing number of people are likely to be renting in retirement or paying a mortgage.
Housing costs can vary widely depending on where and how you live, including whether you share costs with others.
If you expect to pay rent or a mortgage, you’ll need to add these costs to the figures shown.
To help with this, we’ve included recent rental market statistics as a guide to possible costs.
| One person | Two person | |
| Minimum Covers all your needs, with some left over for fun | £13,900LONDON £14,600 | £22,500LONDON £24,100 |
| Moderate More financial security and flexibility | £32,700LONDON £34,000 | £45,400LONDON £47,000 |
| Comfortable More financial freedom and some luxuries | £45,400LONDON £47,200 | £62,700LONDON £64,800 |
The Retirement Living Standards can give you a real sense of how you could be spending your money once you stop working, depending on what matters to you and your needs.
Of course, everyone’s situation is different. Your costs will vary depending on your own circumstances and whether you live alone or share expenses with someone else.
Understanding the costs and income you’ll need
The Retirement Living Standards show the cost of different living standards in retirement, not the income you’ll need.
They are designed to help you understand how much you might spend each year at each level. From there, you can work out the level of income required to cover those costs.
To meet these costs, you’ll need enough income after tax. This means the income you need may be higher than the figures shown.
Some costs are not included in the Standards because they vary widely between people. These include:
- housing costs (such as rent or mortgage payments)
- social care
- dependants
- pets and other personal expenses
You’ll need to consider and add these separately based on your own situation.
The Standards can also help you think about how your retirement income might be made up. For example, they can give an indication of the size of defined contribution (DC) pension pot that might be needed if you were to use it to provide a regular income. We have produced a short guide to estimated pension pot sizes.
This information is provided as a guide and does not provide personalised financial advice. Everyone’s circumstances are different, so it’s important to consider your own situation when planning for retirement.
Where retirement income can come from
Many people will receive the State Pension. Details on the current State Pension amounts and eligibility can be found on the Government website. For a two‑person household, this can cover a significant share of shared retirement costs.
You may also have income from:
- Workplace pensions, including defined contribution (DC) and defined benefit (DB) schemes
- Public sector pensions such as the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS)
- Private pensions, savings, investments or other assets
Here we show examples based on people earning:
- The Living Wage
- Typical (median) earnings
- Higher incomes - an income at the 75th percentile means you earn more than 75% of people, while 25% earn more than you.
How the Retirement Living Standards were developed
We partnered with researchers at Loughborough University’s Centre for Research in Social Policy to develop the Retirement Living Standards.
The Minimum Standard is based on the Minimum Income Standard, funded by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. The Moderate and Comfortable Standards were developed through research with groups of people across the UK.
These groups identified the goods, services and activities needed for different standards of living in retirement, including:
House
- Household bills (e.g. water, council tax, insurance, electricity)
- Telephone bills (landline and mobile) and line rental
- Decorating and maintenance
- Furniture, cleaning supplies, lightbulbs, cooking utensils, appliances (e.g. fridge, washing machine), garden supplies, towels, bedding, etc.
- Gardener/cleaner/window cleaner (if applicable)
- Funeral plan (if applicable)
Food
- Eating out budget
- Groceries
- Beer and wine
Transport
- Car (if applicable)
- Railcard and train travel
- Taxis
Holidays & Leisure
- TV, laptop, printer, speakers, CDs and stationery supplies
- TV license and subscriptions
- Internet
- Activities
- Holidays, spending money and passport
Clothing & Personal
- Clothing and footwear budget
- Cosmetics, toothbrush, toothpaste, shaving supplies, hair styling, beauty treatments (if applicable), suitcases, umbrellas
- Dentist, opticians, podiatry, minor first aid (e.g. plasters, paracetamol)
Helping Others
- Gifts for others
- Helping others (if applicable)
- Charitable donations
From this, we were able to calculate a cost for all these items and work out what each living standard would cost a year.
How we update the standards
We update the Retirement Living Standards regularly to reflect changes in the cost of living and how people think about retirement.
The latest research was carried out during 2025 with modelling completed in 2026, and any updates are published on this website.
Previous research reports are available at www.pensionsuk.org.uk
Read the latest research report
You can download the detailed baskets of goods data for each Standard from the research.