The last group of Social Security beneficiaries, those born between the 21st and 31st of any month, will receive their December payment on Wednesday, December 24, a date that this year coincides with Christmas Eve.
This Social Security disbursements concludes the regular payment schedule for the month, following the processing of payments for those born between the 1st and 10th and between the 11th and 20th, on the 10th and 17th, respectively.
Your December 24 Social Security Payment: What to Know Before Christmas
The system, which assigns dates based strictly on the day of birth to organize the flow of payments to tens of millions of people, leaves this group waiting for the fourth Wednesday of the month. Supplemental Security Income (SSI) recipients, who follow a different schedule, are not included in this payment schedule, nor are those who began receiving benefits before May 1997, who were paid on the 3rd.
The amount of the payment that will arrive on Christmas Eve has a maximum limit established according to the age at which the beneficiary chose to retire. According to data in effect for December 2025, the maximum monthly benefit for a worker who retired at their full retirement age, which is 67 years old for anyone born in 1960 or later, is $4,873.
Conversely, early retirement at age 62 entails a permanent reduction, placing the maximum possible amount for that group at $2,710 per month. These figures are the upper limit before the application of the cost-of-living adjustment the following year.
Advanced SSI Payments: What Social Security Recipients Must Know
A separate chapter in the year-end calendar is dedicated to the approximately 7.5 million beneficiaries of the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program. For them, December brings a change to the usual payment schedule.
Because January 1, 2026, is a federal holiday, the Social Security Administration will advance the January payment to Wednesday, December 31, 2025. This means that SSI recipients will receive two payments in the last month of the year: their regular December payment on the 1st, and their January payment on the last day of the year.
Always have in mind that the December 31 payment is not a bonus, but rather the January benefit issued in advance, so beneficiaries should plan their budgets to ensure that these funds cover their needs for the entire following month.
Specifically, this advance SSI payment will be the first to reflect the 2.8% cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) increase for 2026. Thanks to this increase, the maximum federal SSI amount for an eligible individual will rise from $967 to $994 per month. For Social Security retirement and disability (SSDI) beneficiaries, the 2.8% increase will be applied to their first payment of 2026, which for most will arrive during January, depending on their birthdate.
