The most Googled retirement question in Britain... answered
And our Epic Retirement Flagship UK Course is launching on sale tomorrow. I'm excited.
What’s in the newsletter?
Feature: The two things that will shape your retirement more than money
From Bec’s Desk: Our Epic Retirement Flagship UK Course is launching on sale tomorrow
Read my articles in The Times: We’ve been married for 30 years but can’t agree on when to retire’
How much do you really need to retire in the UK?
It’s the most Googled retirement question in Britain. And the answer most people find sends them straight to a number that feels impossibly large. So let’s look at this properly.
The benchmark most financial planners use
Pensions UK publishes annual Retirement Living Standards that break down what different retirement lifestyles actually cost. They’re built on real research with real people, not just index-linked guesswork. Their 2025 figures describe three tiers:
A minimum retirement covers all your basic needs with a little left over – a week’s holiday in the UK, some leisure, no car. That costs £13,400 a year for a single person, £21,600 for a couple.
A moderate retirement adds a small car, a two-week European holiday, more flexibility on food and clothes, and the ability to eat out occasionally. That costs £31,300 for a single person, £43,900 for a couple.
A comfortable retirement means longer holidays, more eating out, a regular budget for replacing things around the home, and genuine financial freedom day to day. That costs £43,900 for a single person, £60,600 for a couple.
When people see those comfortable figures, many feel like they’re already running behind the standard they need to be at. Here’s what they’re missing.
The State Pension is doing more work than you think
The full new State Pension in 2026/27 pays £241.30 a week or £12,548 a year. You need 35 qualifying years of National Insurance contributions to get the full amount, and you can check your forecast right now at gov.uk.
Here’s the reassuring part: a couple where both partners receive the full State Pension already has around £25,096 a year between them, enough to meet the Minimum standard without drawing a single pound from private savings.
For most people, the real planning question isn’t “how do I replace my entire income from a pension pot?” It’s “how much do I need my private pension to add on top of the State Pension to reach the lifestyle I actually want?”
For a moderate retirement as a couple, that gap is roughly £18,800 a year between you. Split two ways, that’s under £10,000 each from private savings. That’s a very different number to the headline figures that tend to frighten people.
What the pot size actually depends on
Once you know the annual income gap you need to fill, you can work backwards. The two main ways to do it are drawdown: keeping your pension invested and drawing from it gradually; or an annuity, which gives you a guaranteed income for life in exchange for your pot.
For a moderate retirement, a single person would need a private pension pot of roughly £330,000–£490,000 depending on how they draw it. For comfortable, around £540,000–£800,000. For couples the numbers per person are significantly lower because of the shared State Pension and shared living costs.
These ranges are wide because the right strategy genuinely varies – annuity rates change with interest rates, drawdown exposes you to market timing, and how long you live changes everything. But the point is this: the numbers are manageable for most people who have been saving steadily, especially when the State Pension is doing its part.
Where do people go wrong?
My biggest concern comes from when people compare their pension pot to the comfortable headline figure and conclude they’re nowhere near and start to panic. But the Pensions UK figures already include the State Pension in the income calculation. Your pot only needs to bridge the gap not fund the whole thing.
So, check your State Pension forecast. Check what your workplace and private pensions are projecting at retirement. Then look at the gap between those two numbers and the lifestyle you actually want. That’s the real planning problem and it’s usually a lot more solvable than the headlines suggest.
How to Have an Epic Retirement walks you through exactly this process – from tracking down your pensions to building a clear picture of what you’ll have and what you’ll need.
OK, we’re ready! And we’re rolling out the pilot of the How to Have an Epic Retirement Course in the UK this week! THIS WEEK!
I’m serious! It will go on sale Monday - and the people on our Expression of Interest list will be notified first. We’re only opening 200 places. We think that’s a good amount to launch a pilot with. In Australia when we launched our pilot 2 years ago - 200 places sold out in 4 days - and that was before it was proven to be a great course 😉. I’ve got my fingers crossed that the UK will be faster.
The pilot will be priced significantly lower than future courses - as we want you to be on board to provide feedback and help us shape anything that’s needed. In fact - we’d love your input and thoughts.
It’s a six week program with 14 modules of content (about 100 lessons) all built specifically for the UK pensions system.
There’s exercises and activities built into every module of the education program - it’s truly interactive.
You do the program as a community, so you can chat with others doing the course on every lesson
And there’s 3 live Q&As with some of the UK’s leading retirement experts.
And there’s a conversation starter workbook to use around the table to get you thinking and talking about what you want.
Oh, and you get an ebook version of How to Have an Epic Retirement too - as the textbook.
You can register your interest here (no obligation). And be first to learn about it.
The course will kick off in late May and go for 6 weeks. So it will be over by high Summer!
Lastly - have you got a friend approaching retirement who you think might enjoy this UK-centric newsletter? I invite you to share it with them. I’m writing weekly on issues related to your epic retirement. It’s designed to inspire and help! We can help more people if you help spread the lessons and the confidence you get from them.
Have a great Sunday! And until next week — make it epic.
Cheers,
Bec Xx
Author, podcast host, columnist, retirement educator, and guest speaker
Get your copy of the UK Bestselling pre-retirement guidebook, How to Have an Epic Retirement: Your ultimate guide to living well, loving life and retiring with financial confidence.
We’ve been married for 30 years but can’t agree on when to retire’
Couples who have spent decades building a financial life together often forget to plan what happens when they stop work, says our retirement expert
Sarah and David had done everything right. They had paid off the mortgage, raised two children, built up decent pension pots, and were (on paper) well placed for their retirement. What they hadn’t done was talk to each other about how that retirement would actually look.
David, 61, was more than ready for his finish line. He had a date in mind and a list of things he wanted to do once he retired. Sarah, 58, had no intention of retiring. She had returned to work after their children had grown up and built a career she genuinely loved. She wasn’t ready to retire and, frankly, couldn’t imagine why anyone her age would be.
After years assuming that they were on the same page, when they eventually sat down to discuss their plans, they realised that they weren’t even reading from the same book.
Retirement planning is almost always framed as a numbers exercise — working out how much you have, how much you need, how long it will last and in what order to spend it to minimise tax. But for couples it should also be a negotiation, and one that you shouldn’t leave too late.
I am the retirement columnist for The Times, UK. You can read this, my most recent column here. And I’ve linked some other recent columns below.
The real risk from AI isn’t losing your job — it’s wrecking your retirement
A drop in income at 30 is inconvenient but at 50 it can be a disaster. We all need to wake up to the risks
Read more here
What I’ve heard should alarm every politician in the country
In an open letter to the government, Times Money’s retirement columnist sets out why people aren’t saving like they should
Read more here
The six biggest retirement fears — and how to solve them
Prepare for all the things that feel scary about giving up work, from running out of money to finding a way to fill up your time
Read more here