FEGLI Calculator

How FEGLI Basic coverage is calculated

The math is simple but easy to misread. Take your annual salary, round it up to the nearest $1,000, then add $2,000. A GS-12 earning $87,500 gets $88,000 + $2,000 = $90,000 in Basic coverage. Someone earning exactly $88,000 gets the same $90,000. Someone at $88,001 rounds up to $89,000, giving them $91,000.

The government pays one-third of the Basic premium. You pay the other two-thirds. The employee share works out to a biweekly rate per $1,000 of coverage that varies by age band. Under 35, you pay $0.16 per $1,000 biweekly. That $90,000 policy costs $14.40 per pay period. Not expensive. By age 55-59, the rate climbs to $0.92 per $1,000, making that same $90,000 policy cost $82.80 biweekly, or $2,152 per year.

This age-banding is the central fact of FEGLI. The coverage amount stays constant while you age. The cost does not.

Options A, B, and C

Basic coverage is automatic for most new hires unless they waive it. The three optional coverages require affirmative election, typically within 60 days of hire or during open seasons.

Option A adds a flat $10,000 of coverage. The biweekly premium ranges from $0.43 under age 35 to $4.98 at age 60-64. It's modest additional coverage at modest cost for most age bands, though the post-65 rate drops back to $2.17 biweekly, which is unusual.

Option B is where federal employees face real decisions. You choose 1x to 5x your annual salary in coverage. The cost scales with both your salary and your age band. At 5x on a $90,000 salary, you're insuring $450,000. Under age 35, that costs $19.35 per pay period. At age 55-59, the rate is $0.347 per $1,000 biweekly, putting that same policy at $156.15 biweekly, or $4,060 per year. If you make it to 60-64 still carrying 5x Option B, you're paying $0.498 per $1,000 biweekly. That's $223.50 per pay period, over $5,811 annually, for a policy you could have replaced with a 20-year term at 40 for a fraction of that cost.

Option C covers family members. Each unit provides $5,000 of coverage for a spouse and $2,500 per eligible child. You can elect up to 5 units, giving a maximum of $25,000 for a spouse and $12,500 per child. The rate per $1,000 of coverage follows the same age-band structure as Option B, though slightly lower rates because family coverage pools across a broader risk group.

The Option B math at age 55 vs. private term

A 55-year-old federal employee with a $95,000 salary carrying 3x Option B has $285,000 in Option B coverage. The biweekly premium at age 55-59 is $285,000 / 1,000 * $0.347 = $98.90 biweekly, $2,571 per year. A 20-year term policy of $285,000 purchased at age 40 in good health would have cost roughly $400-600 per year. The same person at 55, if they need to buy new term coverage now, might pay $2,000-3,500 per year on the private market depending on health. So FEGLI Option B becomes roughly cost-competitive at older ages for people in average or worse health, but remains more expensive than term for healthy employees who planned ahead.

The problem is that most federal employees don't do this comparison at 40. They carry Option B on autopilot, and by 55 they're paying significantly more than they would have if they'd bought term at 40 and saved the difference. If you're under 50 and healthy, the calculation almost always favors buying term and reducing or dropping Option B.

The three Basic reduction choices at retirement

At retirement, you lock in how your Basic coverage will behave for the rest of your life. There are three options.

The 75% Reduction option is free. After you turn 65, your coverage decreases 2% per month until it reaches 25% of the original amount. That takes 37.5 months to fully phase down. On a $90,000 Basic policy, you end up with $22,500 for life. You pay nothing after 65. Most employees choose this because there's no premium cost, and the reduced coverage still provides a death benefit.

The 50% Reduction option costs $0.32 per $1,000 biweekly from retirement until you turn 65. On that $90,000 policy, that's $28.80 biweekly, $748 per year. After 65, coverage drops to $45,000 at no charge. If you retire at 62 and pay the 50% Reduction premium until 65, you spend about $2,245 to retain an extra $22,500 in coverage versus the 75% path. The break-even: your heirs need to receive that coverage at a time when the extra $22,500 matters. For most people, the 75% option is still the right answer.

The No Reduction option costs $1.20 per $1,000 biweekly for the rest of your life. That $90,000 policy costs $108 biweekly, $2,808 per year, indefinitely. If you retire at 60 and live to 85, you pay $70,200 in premiums to maintain coverage that the 75% Reduction option would have cost nothing. The break-even requires dying young enough that the full $90,000 death benefit minus $70,200 in extra premiums beats the $22,500 benefit you'd have under the free option. The math rarely works out in the No Reduction direction.

One practical consideration: do you actually need life insurance in retirement? If your mortgage is paid, your children are grown and self-supporting, and your surviving spouse has their own pension income, the answer may be no. Carrying expensive FEGLI coverage into a retirement where you have no dependents is paying for something nobody needs.

The five-year rule

You must have been covered under FEGLI for the 5 years immediately preceding retirement to carry any coverage into retirement. This is often called the five-year rule, and it trips up employees who waived coverage early.

If you waived Basic coverage when you were first hired and never enrolled, you don't have the 5 years of enrollment and cannot carry FEGLI into retirement regardless of how long you've worked for the government. The same applies to Optional coverages: you need 5 continuous years of that specific option to carry it forward.

FEGLI open seasons are rare. OPM authorized the most recent one in 2016. There's no guarantee of another before you retire. If you've been without FEGLI coverage for a while and care about keeping it, the only reliable path is a qualifying life event, which lets you enroll without a medical exam within 60 days.

Option C: when family coverage makes sense

Option C is often overlooked, but it has a specific use case. If your spouse has a medical condition that makes private life insurance unaffordable or unavailable, FEGLI Option C provides coverage without underwriting. Five units gives your spouse $25,000. That won't replace an income, but it covers funeral costs and a few months of bills. At younger ages the cost is minimal, under $8 biweekly for all 5 units if you're under 35.

For families with healthy spouses who can qualify for private term insurance, private coverage typically wins on both price and flexibility. A $500,000 term policy on a healthy spouse in their 30s costs less annually than 5 units of Option C by the time you hit 50. But FEGLI Option C is the right call when health issues eliminate private market access.

FEGLI and your FERS retirement decision

Life insurance and retirement income interact in ways that aren't obvious. If you elect the FERS survivor benefit for a spouse, they receive a portion of your pension for life after you die. That benefit partly substitutes for life insurance. A spouse with guaranteed survivor annuity income needs less of a death benefit than a spouse with no guaranteed income.

The survivor benefit costs 10% of your pension (for the full election). On a $30,000 annual FERS pension, that's $3,000 per year you're giving up to provide a $19,500 annual survivor annuity. Stacking full FEGLI No Reduction coverage on top of that survivor benefit is paying for two forms of spouse protection simultaneously. For most federal retirees, the survivor annuity plus Social Security survivor benefits plus 75% Reduction Basic FEGLI is more than adequate protection.

The waiver of premium provision

FEGLI has a waiver of premium provision for total disability. If you become totally disabled before age 60 and remain disabled for at least 9 months, your FEGLI premiums are waived and coverage continues at the last enrolled amount. This is different from most private life insurance policies, which do not include disability waivers as a standard feature.

The waiver applies to Basic coverage. Options A, B, and C have their own waiver provisions with similar structures but separate eligibility requirements. If disability protection matters to your life insurance decision, this feature tips slightly in FEGLI's favor versus private term, which rarely includes it without an additional rider.