Size and Scope of the Supplemental Security Income Program, 2024

• About 7.4 million people received federally administered payments in December 2024.
• The average monthly payment in December 2024 was $697.
• Total payments for the year were about $63 billion, including $3.4 billion in federally administered state supplementation.

Profile of Recipients, December 2024

• The majority were female (52 percent).
• Almost 14 percent were under age 18, 53 percent were aged 18 to 64, and 33 percent were aged 65 or older.
• Most (84 percent) were eligible on the basis of blindness or a disability.
• Six out of 10 recipients under age 65 were diagnosed with a mental disorder.
• Fifty-six percent of SSI recipients had no income other than their SSI payment.
• Thirty-four percent of SSI recipients also received Social Security benefits.
• Of the people receiving SSI benefits, 1.4 percent were residing in a Title XIX institution where Medicaid was paying more than half of the cost.
• Despite their disabilities, about 200,000 recipients (3 percent) were working in December 2024.

Since 1974, the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program has guaranteed a minimum level of income for needy aged, blind, or disabled individuals. Each year, this report presents statistics on the SSI program and the people who receive payments from it. This report covers such topics as:

• federal benefit rates, total annual payments, and total recipients;
• federally administered payments;
• recipients of Social Security, SSI, or both;
• children under age 18;
• noncitizens;
• diagnoses of recipients under age 65;
• recipients who work;
• applications;
• awards;
• outcomes of applications for disability benefits; and
• suspensions, terminations, and duration of eligibility.

The Annual Report of the Supplemental Security Income Program Section III and appendixes at https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/ssir/index.html provide program descriptions and background information helpful for understanding the statistics in this report. Also, the Glossary section formerly contained in this report is now provided at https://www.ssa.gov/policy/about/glossary.html.

Your suggestions and comments on this report are welcome and should be directed to statistics@ssa.gov.

Ben Gurga
Acting Executive Director for Analytics
December 2025

All payments are federally administered payments.

All years are calendar years unless otherwise specified.

Monthly statistics shown in tables are for the end of the given month.

Because some values in this report are independently rounded, the sum of components may not equal reported totals, and percentage distributions may not total 100.

Beginning with the 2007 edition, tables from the discontinued reports Children Receiving SSI and SSI Disabled Recipients Who Work were incorporated into this report.

Beginning with the 2020 edition, some of the mental disorder diagnostic groups were renamed:

Also beginning with the 2020 edition, attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD ) diagnoses were reallocated from the “childhood and adolescent disorders not elsewhere classified” group to the “other mental disorders” group to reflect the agency's adoption of an ADHD diagnostic code for both children and adults.