Data
Median Net Worth by Age in America
The typical American family's net worth is $192,900. That's the median from the Federal Reserve's Survey of Consumer Finances — the most thorough measurement of American household wealth that exists, run every three years. The 2022 survey is the most recent released as of August 2026, and every figure on this page comes from its published tables, in 2022 dollars. Here is what net worth looks like at every age.
The numbers, by age
Family net worth by age of reference person, 2022 Survey of Consumer Finances (Table 2 of the Fed's summary report). The Fed publishes these figures in thousands, rounded to the nearest $100.
| Age | Median net worth | Mean net worth |
|---|---|---|
| All families | $192,900 | $1,063,700 |
| Under 35 | $39,000 | $183,500 |
| 35–44 | $135,600 | $549,600 |
| 45–54 | $247,200 | $975,800 |
| 55–64 | $364,500 | $1,566,900 |
| 65–74 | $409,900 | $1,794,600 |
| 75 or older | $335,600 | $1,624,100 |
Median vs. mean — why the two columns disagree so badly
In every row, the mean is roughly four to five and a half times the median. Across all families it's the widest: a mean of $1,063,700 against a median of $192,900. Both numbers are correct; they answer different questions.
The median is the middle family: line every family up by net worth and it's the one standing exactly halfway. Half of families have more, half have less. The mean is the total divided by the number of families — and because wealth is concentrated at the top, a small number of very large fortunes drag the mean far above what any typical family actually has. If ten people are in a room and one of them owns $10 million, the mean net worth in the room is over a million dollars, which describes nobody present.
So when you see "the average American family is worth a million dollars," that's the mean doing its misleading work. If you want to know what's typical, read the median column. If you want to know where the country's wealth sits, the gap between the two columns is itself the answer: mostly at the top.
What counts as net worth
Net worth is everything a family owns minus everything it owes. On the asset side: the home at its market value, vehicles, bank accounts, investment and retirement accounts, and any business the family owns. On the liability side: the mortgage, credit card balances, student loans, auto loans, and everything else with a balance. One consequence worth naming: a family with a $400,000 house and a $350,000 mortgage has $50,000 of net worth in that house, not $400,000 — which is why homeownership moves these numbers more through paid-down mortgages than through big price tags.
How to read the shape of the table
Net worth climbs with age, peaks at 65–74, and then falls. The climb is three decades of compounding doing its slow work: mortgage principal getting paid down, retirement accounts growing, debts retiring. The dip after 75 is retirement in reverse — families begin spending what they built. Neither end is a verdict; the shape is just the life cycle of money.
Two context notes for anyone comparing brackets. First, the under-35 median of $39,000 looks small next to the others, but it grew 143% between the 2019 and 2022 surveys — the biggest jump of any age bracket. Second, the overall median rose 37% over those three years after inflation, which the Fed's report notes is the largest increase in the modern survey's history. In other words: the table above is a high-water mark, not a slow steady baseline.
Compare your own
Your net worth takes about ten minutes to compute: list what you own, list what you owe, subtract. The free net worth calculator does the arithmetic, saves snapshots in your browser, and charts the trend over time — no sign-up, nothing leaves your device. Whether your number lands above or below your bracket's median matters far less than whether it's higher than it was last year; the median is a mile marker, not a grade.
Journalists and bloggers: cite freely
You're welcome to cite or reproduce the table above with a link to this page. The figures are the Federal Reserve's, not ours — we've kept the Fed's own rounding, so you can also cite the primary source directly. If you spot an error, tell us and we'll fix it.
Where the data comes from
All figures are from the 2022 Survey of Consumer Finances, a triennial survey sponsored by the Federal Reserve Board, published October 18, 2023 in "Changes in U.S. Family Finances from 2019 to 2022" (Table 2). Amounts are in 2022 dollars. The survey's unit is the "family" — roughly, a household's core economic unit — grouped by the age of its reference person, the Fed's term for the main respondent. The Fed publishes net worth in thousands rounded to the nearest hundred dollars; we converted to full dollar figures without changing the rounding. The next survey wave had not been released as of August 2026; when it is, this page will be updated.
Sources
- Changes in U.S. Family Finances from 2019 to 2022 — Federal Reserve Board, October 2023 (Table 2: family median and mean net worth)
- Survey of Consumer Finances — Federal Reserve Board, survey homepage and full data
This article is general information, not personalized financial advice. How we write and review articles is covered in the editorial note on our About page.