The federal poverty level, usually shortened to FPL, is the yardstick behind almost every income test in the health insurance system. Your premium tax credit, your cost-sharing reductions, and the Medicaid income limits in your state are all expressed as percentages of it. If you understand this one table, the rest of the ACA math gets much easier.
The Department of Health and Human Services published the 2026 poverty guidelines in a Federal Register notice dated January 13, 2026 and published January 15, 2026, under the authority of 42 U.S.C. 9902(2). HHS updates the guidelines each year based on the change in the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers. The 2026 update reflects a 2.63% price increase between calendar years 2024 and 2025.
After adjusting for inflation, HHS rounds and standardizes the figures so the step between household sizes is uniform. In rare cases the rounding would have pushed a figure below the prior year's level, and where that happened the guideline was held at the prior year's value instead. The result for the 48 contiguous states and the District of Columbia:
Alaska runs higher, from $19,950 for one person to $69,650 for eight, plus $7,100 per additional person. Hawaii runs from $18,360 for one person to $64,070 for eight, plus $6,530 per additional person. The separate Alaska and Hawaii figures reflect administrative practice dating back to the 1966 to 1970 period. The guidelines are not defined for Puerto Rico or the other outlying jurisdictions, where the administering federal office decides which figures to use.
A downloadable CSV of the full table is available on the calculator page.
Two different poverty measures get confused constantly. The poverty thresholds are the Census Bureau's statistical measure, used to count how many people live in poverty. The poverty guidelines are the simplified version HHS issues each year for program eligibility. The guidelines are roughly equal to the prior calendar year's thresholds. When a form or a calculator asks for your income as a percentage of the poverty level, it means the guidelines, not the thresholds.
The Marketplace applies the guidelines published in the January before your coverage year. That timing rule matters: the 2026 guidelines published in January 2026 govern eligibility for plan year 2027, the year you shop for during the open enrollment that begins November 1, 2026. The 2025 guidelines governed plan year 2026.
Three ACA calculations run directly off these numbers. First, the eligibility window itself: under current law the premium tax credit covers incomes from 100% to 400% of the poverty level, so the guideline for your household size sets both the floor and the ceiling in dollars. For a four-person household in the contiguous states in 2026, that window runs from $33,000 to $132,000. Second, the applicable percentage: the IRS table that sets your expected contribution is keyed to your income as a percentage of the guideline. Third, the repayment limits on Form 8962, which cap how much excess advance credit you repay, are also tiered by poverty-level percentage, at least for tax years through 2025.
One technical detail with real consequences: when the IRS computes your income as a percentage of the poverty level, it truncates instead of rounding. A household at 399.7% of the poverty level is treated as 399%, which keeps it inside the 400% eligibility ceiling. A household at 400.9% is treated as 400% for the same reason. The fraction is dropped, not rounded up.
The poverty guideline does not define your household or your income for you. The Marketplace and the tax code do that separately: your tax household, meaning you, your spouse if you file jointly, and the dependents you claim, and your modified adjusted gross income. Two households with the same paycheck can land at different percentages of the poverty level if one has more people in it or different deductions. The guideline is only the denominator. Getting the numerator right, your MAGI and your household size, is where most estimation errors happen.
For the 48 contiguous states and DC, the 2026 poverty guideline is $15,960 for a household of one, rising by $5,680 per additional person to $55,720 for a household of eight. Alaska and Hawaii have higher separate figures.
The guidelines published in January govern the coverage year that follows. The 2026 guidelines, published January 2026, apply to plan year 2027 eligibility.
No. The guidelines are a simplified version of the Census Bureau's poverty thresholds, issued annually by HHS for program eligibility. The thresholds are the statistical measure used to count people in poverty.
Separate, higher guidelines for Alaska and Hawaii reflect administrative practice dating to the 1966 to 1970 period, accounting for higher costs of living in those states.