New Zealand Superannuation
New Zealand Superannuation is paid from age 65 to people who meet a residence requirement. It is not built from what you earned or what you paid in — there is no contributions record to check. The weekly amount is set by Parliament in Schedule 1 of the New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income Act 2001, and which of its rates applies to you depends only on who you live with. The figures below are those in force from 1 April 2026.
What decides the amount
Nothing is calculated from your working life. There is no contributions record, no qualifying-years count and no accrual: the Act says the rate payable to you is the appropriate rate in Schedule 1, and which one that is depends only on your living situation. Someone who has never been employed is paid the same as someone who worked for fifty years.
| Your situation | A week, before tax |
|---|---|
| to a single person who is living aloneSchedule 1 Part 1 clause 1(a) | $647.37 |
| to a single person who is not living aloneSchedule 1 Part 1 clause 1(b) | $595.57 |
| to a person who is married or in a civil union or in a de facto relationshipSchedule 1 Part 1 clause 1(c) | $492.14 |
These are weekly amounts before tax — Schedule 1 says so in its own opening line. New Zealand Superannuation is taxable income, and what you actually receive depends on your total income and your tax code. This page does not state a tax rate, because the superannuation Act does not contain one.
The rates move on 1 April each year, by an Order in Council that rewrites the figures in the Act itself. That is why the numbers above are the amounts payable and not a historical base: the Act’s own text is amended, and each clause carries a note naming the Order that last moved it.
Your age: 65, for everyone
Every person who reaches 65 is entitled to New Zealand Superannuation. There is no birth-year table for the age, no phased increase and no different age for men and women — one age, in one sentence of the Act. What does vary by your date of birth is the residence requirement below, and the two are easy to confuse.
The residence requirement — a gate, not a sliding scale
You must be ordinarily resident in New Zealand on the day you apply, and you must have been both resident and present here for a total length of time that depends on when you were born. Of that total, 10 years must be in New Zealand itself; the rest may be in New Zealand, the Cook Islands, Niue or Tokelau.
| If you were born | Total time required |
|---|---|
| on or before 30 June 1959 | 10 years |
| 1 July 1959 – 30 June 1961 (inclusive) | 11 years |
| 1 July 1961 – 30 June 1963 (inclusive) | 12 years |
| 1 July 1963 – 30 June 1965 (inclusive) | 13 years |
| 1 July 1965 – 30 June 1967 (inclusive) | 14 years |
| 1 July 1967 – 30 June 1969 (inclusive) | 15 years |
| 1 July 1969 – 30 June 1971 (inclusive) | 16 years |
| 1 July 1971 – 30 June 1973 (inclusive) | 17 years |
| 1 July 1973 – 30 June 1975 (inclusive) | 18 years |
| 1 July 1975 – 30 June 1977 (inclusive) | 19 years |
| on or after 1 July 1977 | 20 years |
There is a second condition that applies as well as the total, not instead of it: since turning 50 you must have been resident and present in those same places for at least 5 years. Clearing the total but not this one does not qualify you.
The example the Act itself gives
Someone born overseas on 30 June 1967 becomes both resident and present in New Zealand on 1 July 2022, at age 55. Their date of birth puts them on the 14-year row of the table above, so the earliest date they can meet the requirement is 1 July 2036 — at age 69.
Note what that means, because it is the point of the whole rule: they turn 65 on 30 June 2032 and are still not entitled. 4 more years pass before anything is payable — and then the full rate is payable. Meeting the requirement late does not pay a smaller pension; not meeting it pays nothing.
The Act’s own words: A person (B) is born overseas on 30 June 1967. B moves to New Zealand and becomes both resident and present in New Zealand on 1 July 2022 at age 55. The earliest date on which B can meet their total time requirement is 14 years later, on 1 July 2036, at age 69. B meets this requirement by being both resident and present in New Zealand for a total of 12 years, in the Cook Islands for a total of 1 year, and in Niue for a total of 1 year.
A separate rule applies to people recognised as refugees or protected persons who were 45 or older when they first became resident and present here: their requirement is worked out under its own section instead of the table. For someone 55 or older on that date it is 10 years. For someone between 45 and 55 it is whichever is shorter: the figure from the table, or the time between that date and their 65th birthday.
If you are in hospital long-term
The rate of New Zealand superannuation payable to a person who is a patient in a hospital for more than 13 weeks is, on and after the commencement of the 14th week of hospitalisation, the rate specified in clause 3 of Schedule 1. The rate payable to a patient in hospital for 13 weeks or less is not affected.New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income Act 2001 (NZ), s 19(3), (4)
It is stated differently from the rates above — as an amount after tax at code M, not before it — so it is not comparable with them, and the two should never be read side by side as though they were the same kind of figure. That rate is $58.34 a week, under Schedule 1 Part 1 clause 3.
Qualifications to that rate
- The chief executive may pay a patient a higher rate than the clause 3 rate, having regard to the patient’s personal financial circumstances.New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income Act 2001, s 19(4A)
- Where the reduced rate applies and the person is absent from hospital for not more than 28 days, the rate on return is determined as if the absence had not occurred.New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income Act 2001, s 19(8)
- The reduction does not apply to a resident assessed as requiring care (as defined in s 5 of the Residential Care and Disability Support Services Act 2018) whose contracted care services are being paid for by a funder under that Act.New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income Act 2001, s 19(5)
- Where a partnered person’s superannuation is reduced under this section, their spouse or partner’s specified benefit is increased by the difference between the single maximum rate and the partnered maximum rate of that benefit.New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income Act 2001, s 19(7), (7A)
A closed, older rate you may still be paid
One group is paid under a different part of Schedule 1: people whose husband, wife or partner is not entitled to New Zealand Superannuation, and who already held that arrangement before it was closed. It is closed. Nobody has been able to enter this group since the election had to be in effect on 9 November 2020, and it can be lost — if your partner becomes entitled, if the relationship ends, or on a long absence from New Zealand.
The saved rates are $984.28 and $933.16 a week before tax, and unlike the rates at the top of this page they are income-tested. The test reduces the rate by 70 cents for every dollar of your and your partner’s combined income above $160.00 a week. That test does not touch the ordinary rates above: if you are not in this closed group, your New Zealand Superannuation is not income-tested at all.
One number that looks like another. The clause 1(a) saved rate of $984.28 is exactly twice the clause 1(c) partnered rate of $492.14, and the identity held last year too ($952.94 = 2 x $476.47). NO PROVISION STATES IT AS A RULE, and the two figures are moved by DIFFERENT POWERS: the partnered rate by the MANDATORY consumers-price-index adjustment under s 15 of this Act (SL 2026/36 clause 6), the saved rate by a DISCRETIONARY increase under s 452 of the Social Security Act 2018 (SL 2026/36 clause 7(2)). Nothing compels them to move together, and a discretion not exercised in some future year would break the identity silently. They are two different entitlements that currently share a number — never one figure, and never derived from each other.
This page describes the main rules of the New Zealand Superannuation and Retirement Income Act 2001 as they stand from 1 April 2026. It is an overview, not a complete account of every case — periods spent overseas, agreements with other countries and a veteran’s pension all have rules of their own that are not covered here.