Dutch state pension holiday allowance jumps 20% in 2026, up 47% since 2023

The Netherlands’ net AOW holiday allowance will rise sharply in 2026, with payments increasing 20 percent compared with 2025 and 47 percent compared with 2023, according to calculations from senior platform AOW.nu. The Social Insurance Bank (SVB) is scheduled to transfer the payment on May 21.

For single AOW recipients, the net holiday allowance will be approximately 1,174 euros in 2026, up from about 978 euros in 2025 and roughly 798 euros in 2023. The platform says this marks a historically large increase compared with earlier years, when annual adjustments were typically limited to small increments.

Married or registered partners also see significant gains. Where one partner is eligible for AOW, the 2026 net holiday allowance is about 838 euros. When both partners receive AOW, the combined net holiday allowance rises to approximately 1,677 euros, compared with about 1,140 euros in 2023.

AOW.nu founder Erwin Smulders says the allowance has reached its highest level ever, describing the increase as an unprecedented rise not seen before in the system’s history.

The sharp growth is driven primarily by increases in the statutory minimum wage, to which the Dutch AOW pension is linked. As the minimum wage rises, AOW benefits and associated holiday allowances increase automatically.

Inflation and higher costs for groceries, energy, and housing also played a role in earlier policy decisions to raise the minimum wage further. Those adjustments have fed through into higher monthly AOW payments and accumulated holiday allowances.

Therefore, according to AOW.nu, many pensioners are now seeing a clearly higher holiday payment in their bank accounts for the first time in years due to these combined effects.