What is the 10-year rule for an inherited IRA?

Most non-spouse beneficiaries of someone who died after 2019 must empty the inherited IRA by December 31 of the tenth year after death. There is no requirement to take equal amounts, only that the account is empty by the deadline.

Do I have to take a distribution every year?

Only if the original owner had already begun their own required minimum distributions. If they died before RMDs began, just the deadline applies.

Is an inherited IRA taxed as income or capital gains?

An inherited traditional IRA is taxed as ordinary income, stacked on top of your other income. There is no 10% early-withdrawal penalty regardless of your age.

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You inherited an IRA. What do you actually have to take out?

Since the SECURE Act most people who inherit an IRA have to empty it within ten years — and every dollar comes out as ordinary income, stacked on top of whatever you already earn. Three questions and you will see the number.

Balance of the inherited IRA

Year the original owner died

Your relationship to them

Had they already started their own RMDs?

Your filing status

Your other taxable income

The part the deadline hides

Ten years sounds generous. What it actually does is stack a large account on top of your peak earning years, and the default — doing nothing until year ten — is almost always the most expensive choice available. The free one-page sheet covers the timing decisions, the bracket math, and the situations where the rules are different.

Waiting until year 10 pushes the entire balance into a single tax year, often several brackets higher.
Taking it evenly is not automatically right either — a retirement year with low income may be the cheapest year to take more.
Spouses have options nobody else has, including treating it as their own. Those are worth knowing before you roll anything.

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Inherited balance
Must be emptied by
Years remaining
Even withdrawal per year
Federal tax on each year's withdrawal
Your bracket once it stacks on your income
Total federal tax over the whole period
What reaches you after federal tax