A marriage that lasted a decade leaves something behind that many divorced Americans never claim: a potential Social Security benefit based on an ex-spouse’s work record. If you were married at least 10 years, you may be entitled to a monthly check worth up to half of what your former spouse gets at full retirement age. Your ex doesn’t have to agree to it, won’t be notified in any way that changes their life, and won’t lose a dime.

This benefit exists mostly for people who spent years out of the workforce or earning less while married, often raising children. But plenty of people who qualify simply never apply, because nobody told them the rule. Here’s how it actually works.

The four boxes you have to check

According to the Social Security Administration, you can claim benefits on a former spouse’s record if all of these are true:

First, the marriage lasted at least 10 years before the divorce became final. This is a cliff, not a slope. Nine years and eleven months gets you nothing; ten years gets you the full option. (Divorce lawyers know this, which is why some divorces quietly wait a few months to finalize.)

Second, you are currently unmarried. Your ex’s marital status doesn’t matter; yours does.

Third, you are at least 62 years old.

Fourth, your former spouse is entitled to Social Security retirement or disability benefits. And here’s a detail that removes a common worry: if your ex qualifies for benefits but hasn’t filed yet, you can still claim on their record as long as you’ve been divorced for at least two years and your ex is at least 62. The federal rules for this “independently entitled” status are spelled out in the Code of Federal Regulations. You don’t need your ex’s cooperation, and you don’t need to know where they live or what they earn. Social Security looks up their record for you.

How much the check is

The maximum divorced-spouse benefit is 50 percent of your ex’s full retirement benefit, and you only get that full 50 percent if you wait until your own full retirement age to claim. For anyone born in 1960 or later, that’s 67. Claim at 62 and the amount is permanently reduced.

One thing that trips people up: when you apply, Social Security compares the divorced-spouse benefit with the retirement benefit you earned on your own work record, and pays you an amount equal to the higher of the two. You don’t stack them. If your own benefit would be $1,200 a month and half of your ex’s is $1,000, you get your own $1,200 and the 10-year rule changes nothing. The rule matters most for people whose own earnings history is much thinner than their ex’s.

Also worth knowing: unlike your own retirement benefit, a spousal benefit does not grow if you wait past full retirement age. There’s no reward for delaying a divorced-spouse claim beyond 67.

Your claim costs your ex nothing

This is the fear that stops people from applying, so it’s worth saying clearly: benefits paid to you as a divorced spouse do not reduce your ex’s benefit, their current spouse’s benefit, or anything paid to their family, and SSA’s family benefits rules treat your claim entirely separately. The money doesn’t come out of anyone’s check. Multiple ex-spouses can even claim on the same worker’s record, each independently, if each marriage cleared the 10-year bar.

Remarriage: the rule that giveth and taketh away

Remarrying generally ends your ability to collect on a living ex-spouse’s record. If your new marriage later ends, whether by divorce, annulment, or death, you can become eligible on the earlier record again.

The rules soften considerably after a death. If your ex-spouse has died and the marriage lasted 10 years, you may qualify for survivor benefits as a surviving divorced spouse, worth up to 100 percent of what your ex was receiving, not just half. Survivor benefits can begin as early as age 60 (age 50 if you’re disabled), and remarrying after you turn 60 does not take them away. That age-60 line is one of the most consequential dates in the whole program for widowed and divorced people weighing a late-in-life remarriage.

How to apply, and what to bring

You can apply online at ssa.gov, by phone at 800-772-1213, or at a local office. Have your marriage certificate and divorce decree available, since those documents are how SSA verifies the 10-year duration. You’ll also want your ex’s Social Security number if you know it, but if you don’t, SSA can usually locate the record from their name, date of birth, and parents’ names.

Before you file anything, it’s worth opening a my Social Security account and checking your own earnings record, because the whole decision comes down to comparing your own projected benefit against half of your ex’s. If you’re within a few years of 62, that comparison, not the 10-year rule itself, is what should drive the timing of your claim. Claiming at 62 locks in a permanent reduction on whichever benefit you take, so a year or two of patience can mean a meaningfully larger check for the rest of your life.

The 10-year rule doesn’t fix everything about how divorce reshapes retirement. But it’s one of the few places in the system where a phone call and two documents can turn a decade of a former marriage into real monthly income, without a fight and without anyone else losing a thing.

This article was produced with AI assistance and reviewed by a human editor. Figures are linked to their primary sources; where a claim could not be verified from the public record, we say so.