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HHS Poverty Guidelines

Published by Office of Human Services Policy | U.S. Department of Health & Human Services | Catalog Last Checked: September 28, 2026 at 08:05 PM | Dataset Last Updated: January 15, 2026
The HHS poverty guidelines are a simplified version of the federal poverty measure, issued annually by the HHS Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) and used as an eligibility criterion by Medicaid and numerous other federal programs. As required by Section 673(2) of the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1981 (42 U.S.C. 9902(2)), the Secretary of HHS updates the guidelines at least annually by adjusting the most recent Census Bureau poverty thresholds by the change in the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U). Each annual update covers the 48 contiguous states and DC, with separate figures for Alaska and Hawaii, and is published in the Federal Register. Guidelines are available from 1982 to the current year; the most recent update (2026) reflects a 2.63 percent CPI-U increase between 2024 and 2025 and was effective January 13, 2026 unless a program specified a different date. Each year's computations are posted on ASPE's Prior HHS Poverty Guidelines and Federal Register References page, and machine-readable values from 1983 to the current year are available through the Poverty Guidelines API.

Resources

4 resources available

  • Poverty Guidelines API

    JSON
    No link available

  • Prior HHS Poverty Guidelines and Federal Register References (web page)

    HTML
    Visit Page

  • Current (2026) Poverty Guidelines Computations (web page)

    HTML
    Visit Page

  • Current (2026) Poverty Guidelines: 48 Contiguous States (PDF)

    PDF
    Download

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Complete Metadata
@type Dataset
accessRights public
accrualPeriodicity annually
contactPoint 
[
  {
    "fn": "Kendall Swenson",
    "@type": "Kind",
    "hasEmail": "mailto:Kendall.swenson@hhs.gov"
  }
]
description The HHS poverty guidelines are a simplified version of the federal poverty measure, issued annually by the HHS Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) and used as an eligibility criterion by Medicaid and numerous other federal programs. As required by Section 673(2) of the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1981 (42 U.S.C. 9902(2)), the Secretary of HHS updates the guidelines at least annually by adjusting the most recent Census Bureau poverty thresholds by the change in the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U). Each annual update covers the 48 contiguous states and DC, with separate figures for Alaska and Hawaii, and is published in the Federal Register. Guidelines are available from 1982 to the current year; the most recent update (2026) reflects a 2.63 percent CPI-U increase between 2024 and 2025 and was effective January 13, 2026 unless a program specified a different date. Each year's computations are posted on ASPE's Prior HHS Poverty Guidelines and Federal Register References page, and machine-readable values from 1983 to the current year are available through the Poverty Guidelines API.
distribution 
[
  {
    "@type": "Distribution",
    "title": "Poverty Guidelines API",
    "format": "JSON",
    "mediaType": "application/json",
    "description": "Machine-readable JSON access to the poverty guidelines (1983 to current year) via the ASPE Poverty Guidelines API, by year, state, and household size.",
    "accessService": [
      {
        "@id": "https://aspe.hhs.gov/topics/poverty-economic-mobility/poverty-guidelines/poverty-guidelines-api",
        "@type": "DataService",
        "title": "ASPE Poverty Guidelines API",
        "publisher": {
          "name": "Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation",
          "@type": "Organization"
        },
        "endpointURL": [
          "https://aspe.hhs.gov/topics/poverty-economic-mobility/poverty-guidelines/api/"
        ],
        "contactPoint": [
          {
            "fn": "ASPE Poverty Guidelines Team",
            "@type": "Kind",
            "hasEmail": "mailto:Kendall.swenson@hhs.gov"
          }
        ],
        "endpointDescription": [
          "https://aspe.hhs.gov/topics/poverty-economic-mobility/poverty-guidelines/poverty-guidelines-api"
        ]
      }
    ],
    "useRestriction": [
      {
        "@type": "UseRestriction",
        "restrictionStatus": "Unrestricted"
      }
    ],
    "accessRestriction": [
      {
        "@type": "AccessRestriction",
        "restrictionNote": "No legal or technical access restrictions apply. Data is published publicly.",
        "restrictionStatus": "Unrestricted",
        "specificRestriction": "None"
      }
    ]
  },
  {
    "@type": "Distribution",
    "title": "Prior HHS Poverty Guidelines and Federal Register References (web page)",
    "format": "HTML",
    "accessURL": "https://aspe.hhs.gov/topics/poverty-economic-mobility/poverty-guidelines/prior-hhs-poverty-guidelines-federal-register-references",
    "mediaType": "text/html",
    "description": "Umbrella page linking each year's poverty guidelines computations and their Federal Register notices.",
    "useRestriction": [
      {
        "@type": "UseRestriction",
        "restrictionStatus": "Unrestricted"
      }
    ],
    "accessRestriction": [
      {
        "@type": "AccessRestriction",
        "restrictionNote": "No legal or technical access restrictions apply. Data is published publicly.",
        "restrictionStatus": "Unrestricted",
        "specificRestriction": "None"
      }
    ]
  },
  {
    "@type": "Distribution",
    "title": "Current (2026) Poverty Guidelines Computations (web page)",
    "format": "HTML",
    "accessURL": "https://aspe.hhs.gov/topics/poverty-economic-mobility/poverty-guidelines/prior-hhs-poverty-guidelines-federal-register-references/2026-poverty-guidelines-computations",
    "mediaType": "text/html",
    "description": "Human-readable computations page for the current-year (2026) poverty guidelines (48 contiguous states and DC).",
    "useRestriction": [
      {
        "@type": "UseRestriction",
        "restrictionStatus": "Unrestricted"
      }
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    "accessRestriction": [
      {
        "@type": "AccessRestriction",
        "restrictionNote": "No legal or technical access restrictions apply. Data is published publicly.",
        "restrictionStatus": "Unrestricted",
        "specificRestriction": "None"
      }
    ]
  },
  {
    "@type": "Distribution",
    "title": "Current (2026) Poverty Guidelines: 48 Contiguous States (PDF)",
    "format": "PDF",
    "mediaType": "application/pdf",
    "description": "Detailed current-year (2026) poverty guidelines table in PDF form.",
    "downloadURL": "https://aspe.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/documents/b1bfa16b20ae9b89d525bc35de7c1643/detailed-guidelines-2026.pdf",
    "useRestriction": [
      {
        "@type": "UseRestriction",
        "restrictionStatus": "Unrestricted"
      }
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    "accessRestriction": [
      {
        "@type": "AccessRestriction",
        "restrictionNote": "No legal or technical access restrictions apply. Data is published publicly.",
        "restrictionStatus": "Unrestricted",
        "specificRestriction": "None"
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]
identifier https://aspe.hhs.gov/topics/poverty-economic-mobility/poverty-guidelines/prior-hhs-poverty-guidelines-federal-register-references
inventoried 2026-09-27
isPartOf https://aspe.hhs.gov/topics/poverty-economic-mobility/poverty-guidelines/poverty-guidelines-api
isReferencedBy 
[
  "https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/01/15/2026-00755/annual-update-of-the-hhs-poverty-guidelines"
]
issued 1982-01-01
keyword 
[
  "CPI-U",
  "FPL",
  "federal poverty level",
  "income eligibility",
  "poverty",
  "poverty guidelines"
]
landingPage 
{
  "@type": "Document",
  "title": "Poverty Guidelines | ASPE",
  "accessURL": "https://aspe.hhs.gov/topics/poverty-economic-mobility/poverty-guidelines"
}
modified 2026-01-15
publisher 
{
  "name": "Office of Human Services Policy",
  "@type": "Organization",
  "subOrganizationOf": [
    {
      "name": "Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE)",
      "@type": "Organization",
      "subOrganizationOf": [
        {
          "name": "U.S. Department of Health and Human Services",
          "@type": "Organization"
        }
      ]
    }
  ]
}
rights 
[
  "This data asset is an open government data asset. It is not exempt from disclosure under FOIA. It is a public data asset eligible for disclosure in the Federal Data Catalog."
]
spatial 
[
  {
    "@type": "Location",
    "prefLabel": "United States"
  }
]
status active
theme 
[
  {
    "@type": "Concept",
    "prefLabel": "Poverty and Economic Mobility"
  }
]
title HHS Poverty Guidelines

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