SNAP Work Requirements Now Reach Adults 55 to 64

Older adults who rely on food assistance are running into a rule that did not apply to them a year ago. A federal law passed in 2025 raised the top age for SNAP work requirements from 54 to 64. Adults in their late 50s and early 60s who could once receive benefits without meeting a work test now have to document 80 hours a month of work, job training, or volunteering, or they lose their benefits after three months.

The change comes from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the tax-and-spending law signed on July 4, 2025. It rewrote parts of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the program most people still call food stamps. States began applying the new age rule in late 2025 and early 2026. If you are between 55 and 64 and get SNAP, or you help an older relative who does, the new rules are worth understanding before a deadline catches you off guard.

What the rule requires

SNAP has long carried a separate work requirement for what the government calls able-bodied adults without dependents. People in that group can get benefits for only three months in any three-year period unless they meet a monthly work test. The test itself did not change. What changed is who has to meet it.

To keep benefits past three months, a person subject to the rule has to do at least one of these things every month:

• Work at least 80 hours, whether paid, unpaid, or in exchange for goods or services.
• Take part in a work or training program, such as SNAP Employment and Training, for at least 80 hours.
• Combine work and program hours to reach 80 hours.
• Take part in workfare for the hours the state assigns.

Eighty hours a month works out to about 20 hours a week. Miss the test without an exemption, and benefits stop after three months. To start again, a person has to meet the requirement for a 30-day stretch or qualify for an exemption. Otherwise they wait until the next three-year window opens.

Who is newly affected

Until this law took effect, the work requirement stopped at age 54. Anyone 55 and up was past it. Now the cutoff is 64, so adults ages 55 through 64 are covered for the first time. According to the National Council on Aging, the expanded age rule reached most states by February 2026.

The law also narrowed the exemption for parents and caregivers. A household used to be excused if it included any child under 18. Now the child has to be under 14. Caregivers living with a child ages 14 to 17, and no younger child, can be subject to the work requirement even though they were exempt before.

The exemptions the law cut

The 2025 law also removed three exemptions that Congress had added in 2023. Veterans, people experiencing homelessness, and young adults who aged out of foster care are no longer automatically excused from the work requirement. Those groups had been exempt as recently as 2024.

Several core exemptions stayed in place. You are still excused from the work requirement if you are medically certified as unable to work because of a physical or mental condition, if you are pregnant, if you live with a child under 14, or if you are already meeting the general SNAP work rules another way. The table below shows the before-and-after at a glance.

If you are 65 or older

This rule does not apply to you. The able-bodied adult work requirement runs from age 18 through 64, so anyone 65 and up is not subject to it. Turning 65 also ends the requirement for someone who was meeting it at 64. If you are 65 or older and a caseworker tells you that you have to meet a work test to keep SNAP, ask for a supervisor and a written explanation, because the age rule does not reach you.

For a fuller picture of how food assistance works for older adults, including income limits and the extra deductions many seniors qualify for, see our guide to SNAP benefits for seniors.

How many people this could affect

The reach is large. The Congressional Budget Office estimated that the expanded work requirement would end SNAP for roughly 2.4 million people in a typical month. About 800,000 of them are adults ages 55 to 64 who do not live with children, according to an analysis of the CBO figures by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Those are projections, not counts of people already dropped, and the real total will depend on how states apply the rule and how many recipients can document their hours.

The practical risk for many older adults is not that they refuse to work. It is paperwork. People who are working enough hours, or who qualify for an exemption, can still lose benefits if they cannot prove it to the state on time. That is why keeping records and responding to state notices matters so much right now.

What to do now

If you are 55 to 64 and receive SNAP, do not wait for a benefits cutoff to act. These steps can protect your benefits:

• Contact your state SNAP agency and ask directly whether the work requirement applies to you and when your three-month clock started.
• Ask whether you qualify for an exemption, such as a medical exemption, and what documentation the state needs.
• Keep proof of your hours, including pay stubs, volunteer logs, or a letter from a training program.
• Open and respond to every letter or message from the SNAP office, since a missed notice can stop benefits on its own.
• If you have a health condition that limits work, ask your doctor for a written statement, which can support a medical exemption.

If your food budget is tight while you sort this out, look at the other programs that can help. Our guides to financial help for seniors and sources of free government money for seniors over 60 list benefits that many older adults miss.

The bottom line

For the first time, the SNAP work requirement reaches adults into their early 60s, and it no longer spares veterans, people who are homeless, or those who recently left foster care. Adults 65 and older are not affected. If you are younger than that and on SNAP, treat any notice from your state as urgent, confirm whether the rule applies to you, and gather proof of your hours or your exemption before a deadline forces the issue.

This article is a news report for general information and is not legal, financial, or benefits advice. SNAP rules and timelines are set by federal law and applied by each state, and some guidance is still being finalized. Confirm your own situation with your state SNAP agency.