A widow or widower who has a disability and collects Social Security as a surviving spouse received an average of $985.57 a month in August 2026. Nondisabled widows and widowers averaged $1,934.37, so the disabled group’s average was about 51% of the other. The figures come from the Social Security Administration’s monthly statistical snapshot, and they cover a small, less-noticed corner of the survivor program.
Two rows in the survivor table
The August 2026 snapshot, released in September, lists 187,000 disabled widow(er)s at an average of $985.57. Just above it sit 3,502,000 nondisabled widow(er)s at $1,934.37. Together the two rows describe about 3.7 million surviving spouses, and the disabled group is roughly 5% of them.
Dividing $985.57 by $1,934.37 gives 0.5095, or about 51%, which is why the difference reads as “about half.” In dollars, the nondisabled average is $948.80 higher each month, which adds up to roughly $11,386 over twelve months. Across the 187,000 disabled survivors, the average implies about $184 million a month in benefits.
The age-50 entry point for disabled survivors
SSA’s survivor eligibility page sets two age tracks for a surviving spouse. One is age 60 or older. The other is “age 50-59 if you have a disability.” Both tracks require the marriage to have lasted at least nine months before the spouse’s death, and the remarriage rule differs: a survivor who is 60 or older must not have remarried before age 60, while a disabled survivor must not have remarried before age 50.
The page adds that a survivor might be eligible at any age, regardless of how long the marriage lasted, when caring for a child of the person who died. That path falls outside the disabled-widow(er) row in the snapshot, which counts only survivors receiving benefits as disabled widows and widowers. The eligibility page is the place where SSA lays out each track’s requirements in full, including the marriage and remarriage tests that apply to a survivor who is under 60.
How the survivor percentage is set
SSA’s survivor amount page says payments “start at 71.5% of your spouse’s benefit and increase the longer you wait to apply.” The page gives sample steps: over 75% at age 61, over 80% at age 63, over 90% at age 65, and up to 100% at full retirement age, which is 66 to 67. The page does not list a separate percentage for disabled surviving spouses.
That means the amount page ties the size of a survivor benefit to the age at which the survivor applies and to the deceased spouse’s benefit. The snapshot, for its part, reports only headcounts and averages. It does not break its disabled-widow(er) row down by age at application or by the deceased spouse’s benefit, so it cannot say why the $985.57 average lands where it does.
A simple hypothetical shows how much the starting percentage matters. If a late spouse’s benefit were $2,000 a month, a payment at the 71.5% starting rate would be $1,430, while a payment at 100% would be $2,000, a $570 difference from the percentage alone. The $2,000 is an invented round number chosen for the arithmetic, not a figure from SSA, and the percentages are the agency’s.
What the gap does and does not show
A reader might be tempted to explain the 51% figure with a single cause, such as early claiming, but none of the three SSA pages says so. What the pages do establish is a set of facts that can coexist with the gap: disabled survivors can begin at 50 while others begin at 60, the percentage of the deceased spouse’s benefit rises with age at application, and the amount depends on the deceased spouse’s record. Any of those could be at work in an individual case, and the averages cannot separate them. Only SSA can calculate a specific person’s survivor amount from the record of the spouse who died.
The comparison is also between two groups, not two people. A disabled widow whose late husband had a high earnings record could receive more than $985.57, and a nondisabled widower whose late wife had a small record could receive less than $1,934.37. The averages describe the groups’ centers, and each household’s payment comes from its own record.
Family maximum and children’s shares
The same amount page notes that children generally get 75% of a deceased parent’s benefit, and that a limit called the family maximum exists: “We may lower everyone’s payments to stay under this limit.” Ex-spouses do not count toward that limit. For a disabled survivor who is also caring for children, the family maximum is one more number that can pull a monthly total down from the simple percentages.
The snapshot’s next release, covering September data and due in mid-October, will show whether the $985.57 and $1,934.37 averages move. Until then, the August 2026 rows are the agency’s latest count of 187,000 disabled survivors and their $985.57 average payment.
Survivor benefits and the timing of a first claim
The disabled-widow(er) average is one result of a survivor system in which the starting age and the deceased spouse’s record shape the monthly amount. Households weighing a survivor benefit against a personal retirement benefit face that timing question directly.
The Social Security Claiming & Family Benefits Kit is a 27-page kit that includes a six-tab calculator for claiming age, break-even and survivor benefits, along with spousal and survivor sequencing worksheets.
Compare survivor and own-benefit sequences in The Social Security Claiming & Family Benefits Kit →
Written with the help of AI and reviewed by an editor against Social Security Administration statistics and rules.
