By Zack Devin
If you receive disability benefits through Social Security Disability Insurance and Supplemental Security Income programs, you may wonder: Can I work part-time on disability? You can, provided you know the rules and comply with them.
How income received from working affects your benefits depends, in part, on whether you receive them through SSDI or SSI. Here is an explanation of work rules to know if you want to try working.
How Income Affects Benefits From SSI And SSDI
The SSI program pays benefits based on financial need. The maximum monthly federal benefit payment is $967 for individuals and $1,450 for eligible couples in 2025. The benefit amounts change annually.
Money earned from working reduces what you receive each month, but earned income is subject to a $65 exclusion. After deducting the first $65 of work earnings, one-half of the remainder of your monthly earnings reduces your monthly SSI benefits.
Work history at jobs subject to payment of Social Security taxes determines eligibility for the SSDI program. You must have worked long enough and recently enough. SSDI benefits are based on your average lifetime earnings, so there is no reduction in benefits for money earned from working.
Substantial Gainful Activity Limit And Your Disability Benefits
You must be disabled according to a definition used by the Social Security Administration, to qualify for SSDI and SSI. The definition requires that you be unable to do substantial gainful activities, which are work activities, to be disabled.
Social Security uses an earnings limit to determine if you can do substantial gainful activity (SGA). The SGA earnings limit for 2025 is $2,700 for someone who is blind and $1,620 for individuals who are not.
If a person receiving disability benefits makes more than the SGA limit, they are not disabled. Someone receiving benefits through SSDI can try returning to work without risking the loss of their disability benefits through a trial work period.
Working While Receiving SSDI – Trial Work Periods
If you want to try working part- or full-time, you can do so during a trial work period that is nine months. Any month you earn more than $1,160 before taxes from working counts as one of the nine months of the trial work period. The months of a trial work period need not be consecutive, but you cannot extend them beyond 60 months.
The following are the benefits of working during a trial work period:
- Money you earn working during a trial period is yours to keep without affecting your SSDI benefits.
- You can earn as much as you can during the trial period without losing eligibility for SSDI, including exceeding the SGA limit.
- If you exceed the SGA limit while working, you continue to receive your monthly SSDI payment.
You participate in a trial work period simply by notifying the Social Security Administration and reporting your monthly income.
Part-Time Work And Disability Benefits –Extended Period Of Eligibility
After a trial work period, you can elect to participate in a 36-month extended period of eligibility (EPE). You can do full- or part-time work and disability benefits through SSDI will continue.
During an EPE, you continue to receive your monthly SSDI benefit payment provided your earnings do not exceed the SGA earnings limits. If you exceed SGA limits, you will not receive disability benefits for the month, and your benefits will end if your earnings continue at the same amount or higher.
If your SSDI benefits ended during an EPA because you earned more than SGA limits, you have five years to request expedited reinstatement. The reinstatement is expedited by not requiring you to complete and file a new application. While your request for reinstatement is under review, you may be entitled to receive disability benefits for as long as six months. Learning more about part-time work and disability benefits is easy. Contact a disability lawyer today.
