The Social Security Administration (SSA) recently announced a 2.8% cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) for Social Security beneficiaries and recipients of Supplemental Security Income. This adjustment, revealed last month, is aimed at helping individuals keep up with inflation, which has led to rising costs for essentials such as energy, gas, and groceries.

This new COLA represents a modest increase from last year’s 2.5% adjustment, reflecting the ongoing economic changes expected in 2025. However, the enhanced benefits will not be distributed until 2026 for most recipients.

Beneficiaries of Social Security can expect to see the 2.8% increase in their payments starting in January 2026. The timing of these payments will depend on the recipient’s birth date. Individuals born from the 1st to the 10th of any month will receive their payments on the second Wednesday of each month. Those born between the 11th and the 20th will receive theirs on the third Wednesday. Finally, individuals born from the 21st to the last day of any month will receive their payments on the fourth Wednesday.

When will the 2.8% COLA take effect?

As discussions continue about potential financial relief measures, including a recently suggested $2,000 tariff rebate by former President Trump, the past implementations and impacts of such measures remain a point of interest and analysis.

Those receiving Supplemental Security Income (SSI) will get their first increased benefits a bit sooner, on Dec. 31, 2025, according to the Social Security Administration. This is because Jan. 1, — aka New Year’s Day — is a federal holiday.

Subsequent payments are disbursed monthly, typically on the 1st of each month. If that date were to fall on a Saturday, a Sunday or a holiday, SSI payments would be disbursed on the latest business day of the previous month.

How much more should beneficiaries expect?

Several factors determine the benefit amount disbursed to a Social Security recipient, including their former earnings, the time frame in which they collected their salaries, and their age at retirement. But the average benefit for a retired worker, as of August 2025, was estimated to be just under $2,008 per month.

Based on this figure, an increase of 2.8% would net the average retiree an extra $56 per month.

Payments for SSI recipients also vary based on factors including employment status, disability benefits or outside earnings, but the maximum benefits are currently set at $967 monthly for individuals, or $1,450 for couples.

A 2.8% cost-of-living adjustment would increase the individual maximum monthly payment to $994, and the couples’ maximum monthly payment to $1,491.

Will it be enough?

Despite these increases, an advocacy group working to protect the benefits of America’s senior citizens has argued that 2026’s COLA — or any COLA in recent years — is not sufficient to cover the rising costs that retirees are paying for things such as housing, groceries or healthcare.

“The 2026 COLA is going to hurt for seniors,” Shannon Benton, the executive director of The Senior Citizens League, wrote shortly after the 2026 COLA was announced. “Year after year, they warn that Social Security’s meager increases won’t be enough, and the Census Bureau estimates that about 10 percent of retirement-age Americans live in poverty.”

TSCL has instead proposed that the Social Security Administration stop basing its COLA increases on data from the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W), but rather the Consumer Price Index for the Elderly (CPI-E) — which is “specifically based on the spending patterns of Americans 62 years of age and older,” according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

TSCL has also voiced support for a system they call “CPI Best,” which means basing each year’s COLA increase on the highest of three options: the CPI-W, the CPI-E, or a minimum increase of 3%.

The same group had also proposed a one-time “make-up payment” of $1,400 for eligible seniors.

“COLA needs to reflect the cost of aging — not just the cost of inflation,” Benton told Nexstar last month. “The formula used for COLA calculations is outdated and doesn’t reflect what seniors actually spend money on, such as healthcare, rent, and prescription drugs. It’s time for a fix.”