Is my life insurance through work enough?

How to use it

1. Enter your salary.
2. Choose your employer's basic coverage: none, a flat amount, or 1, 1.5, 2 or 3 times salary. If you choose a flat amount, type it in the next box. Otherwise that box is ignored.
3. Enter any supplemental coverage you buy at work and the individual policies you own yourself.
4. Enter what your family needs. Take the figure from the How much life insurance do I need?, or start from 10 times income as a rough guide.

How the math works

• Basic coverage = the flat amount, or salary × the multiple you chose.
• Work coverage = basic coverage + supplemental coverage.
• Total coverage = work coverage + your individual policies.
• Covered today = total coverage ÷ what your family needs.
• Gap = what your family needs − total coverage, never below zero.

A bar chart shows the need, work coverage, your own policies and the total. Below it, the tool states how much you would keep if you left your job. That is only your individual policies, shown as a share of the need.

Hypothetical example, using the tool's starting salary of $70,000 and need of $750,000: basic coverage of 1 × salary is $70,000, with no supplemental or individual policies. Total coverage is $70,000, which is 9% of the need, and the gap is $680,000. If you left, you would keep $0, which is 0% of the need.

What it assumes

• The need is your number. The tool does not estimate it.
• Employer coverage is exactly the multiple or amount you enter. The tool applies no plan maximum, age reduction or waiting period.
• Supplemental coverage you buy at work is treated like basic coverage, so it counts as ending with the job.
• Individual policies count in full and stay in force.
• Employer-paid coverage above $50,000 triggers a reminder that the excess creates taxable imputed income. The $50,000 line comes from the IRS group-term life rules, and the imputed income calculator for group life over $50,000 estimates the amount.

Where it stops being right

• Group coverage is often portable or convertible when you leave, which the tool's note acknowledges, usually at higher rates. The tool does not model that. The keeping group life insurance when you leave a job guide explains the options and deadlines.
• It ignores coverage on a spouse or children and any benefit your spouse's employer provides. See dependent life insurance through an employer.
• It does not price anything. Supplemental coverage may require health questions, and the tool does not account for that.
• A result above 100% only means the amounts you entered exceed the need you entered. It does not check that the need is right.

Group life is tied to your employment, not to you. The is life insurance through work enough? guide takes the question further, and employer group life insurance: what it really covers describes what this coverage includes.