Food · guide
SNAP eligibility: who qualifies for food stamps
Five questions decide it: income, resources, who you live and eat with, your immigration status, and whether a student or work rule applies to you.
Checked by Radif Partners · Editorial policy · How we calculate
You are eligible for SNAP when your household passes the income tests and meets the non-financial rules. For fiscal year 2027, which began on October 1, 2026, gross monthly income must be at or under $2,960 for three people under the federal 130% test, and net income at or under $2,277; 44 states and DC raise or replace those tests through broad-based categorical eligibility, up to $4,554 for three. Your household is the people who buy and cook food together, not everyone at the address. Since July 4, 2025, only U.S. citizens, U.S. nationals, green card holders (most after five years), Cuban and Haitian entrants and citizens of the three Compact of Free Association nations can receive SNAP; refugees and people granted asylum lost eligibility unless they hold a green card. Adults aged 18 to 64 without a child under 14 face a time limit, and most college students need an exemption. Families on TANF cash aid or where everyone gets SSI qualify automatically on income.
Do you pass the SNAP income tests?
Income tests, FY 2027
Likely pass
| Gross income line | $4,554: pass |
| Net income before rent | Not required (BBCE) |
| Federal net line (100%) | $2,277 |
Pay is treated as wages (20% deduction). Social Security or unemployment counts in full.
The income conditions
SNAP measures income each month. Under federal rules a household without an older or disabled member must pass two tests: gross income at or under 130% of the poverty guideline, then net income, after deductions, at or under 100%. The full charts by household size are on SNAP income limits. The regulation (7 CFR 273.9(a)) adds that a household with an elderly or disabled member only has to meet the net standard, and that categorically eligible households meet neither test because they are deemed to pass.
That last sentence matters more than it sounds. In 44 states and DC, the agency makes nearly every applicant categorically eligible through broad-based categorical eligibility, a TANF-funded service tied to a state income line. The net test disappears and the gross line is the state's, between 130% and 200% of poverty. In practice, a parent with two children in California can earn up to $4,554 a month and still qualify, while the same family in a state on federal rules stops at $2,960.
A mother of two in Georgia, where BBCE keeps the 130% line, earns $2,600 a month and pays $1,000 rent. Her gross income is under the $2,960 line, so she is in. After the 20% earned income deduction, the standard deduction and the shelter deduction, her net income is $1,390 and the estimated benefit $391 a month. Had she earned $3,010, she would be out regardless of her rent: gross is checked first.
Resources: what you own
Where the federal resource test applies, countable resources must not exceed $3,000, or $4,750 if a member is 60 or older or disabled (USDA memo for fiscal year 2027). Most BBCE states drop the test entirely; a few keep a limit of their own, listed state by state on the income limits page. Cash on hand, checking and savings accounts and savings certificates are the liquid resources the application rules name, and Texas, for one, sets its own treatment of vehicles in its BBCE limit.
Who belongs to your SNAP household
The household is the unit that applies, and its size drives both the income line and the maximum benefit. The household regulation, 7 CFR 273.1, defines it as one of three things: a person living alone; a person who lives with others but customarily buys food and prepares meals separately; or a group who live together and customarily buy and prepare food together. Two adults sharing an apartment can therefore be two households, each with its own income test.
Some people must be in the same household whatever their grocery habits. Spouses always are. So is a person under 22 who lives with a parent or step-parent, and a child under 18 who lives under the parental control of another adult in the home, such as a grandparent. Boarders who pay a reasonable amount for meals are not a household of their own. One exception runs the other way: a person aged 60 or older who cannot buy and cook because of a permanent disability may apply separately from the relatives he lives with, if their income stays under 165% of poverty.
Citizenship and immigration status after July 4, 2025
Section 10108 of the 2025 budget law narrowed the list of non-citizens who can receive SNAP. USDA's implementation memo of October 31, 2025 gives the groups that remain eligible: U.S. citizens, non-citizen U.S. nationals, lawful permanent residents, Cuban and Haitian entrants, and citizens of the Federated States of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands and Palau living here under the Compacts of Free Association. Nationals, Cuban and Haitian entrants and COFA citizens qualify with no waiting period. Lawful permanent residents generally wait five years, unless an exception applies: being under 18, having 40 qualifying work quarters, being blind or disabled, having a U.S. military connection, or having lived here lawfully and been 65 or older on August 22, 1996, among others.
Several groups lost SNAP: refugees, people granted asylum, parolees, people whose deportation is withheld, and the certain Afghan and Ukrainian parolees who had been eligible. Victims of trafficking, battered non-citizens, conditional entrants and Iraqi or Afghan special immigrants remain eligible only once they are lawful permanent residents. The change took effect on July 4, 2025, for new applicants; for households already on SNAP, states applied it at recertification, and USDA told them the removed members owe no overpayment for the months in between.
A household can mix statuses. A member who does not qualify is removed from the SNAP household, and the citizen children or other eligible members can still receive benefits; the agency decides how the excluded person's income is counted. For the effect on Medicaid and Marketplace coverage, see benefits for immigrants.
Work rules, students and other conditions
Adults aged 18 to 64 without a child under 14 in the household face a time limit of 3 months in 36 unless they work or train 80 hours a month or have an exemption; the rules changed in 2025 and are explained in SNAP work requirements. Students enrolled at least half time in college or a trade school are ineligible unless one of the regulation's exemptions applies, such as working 20 hours a week or having work-study; see SNAP for college students.
Automatic eligibility through TANF or SSI
Under 7 CFR 273.2(j)(2), a household in which every member receives or is authorized to receive TANF cash assistance, SSI, or a mix of the two is categorically eligible. The agency does not apply the income or resource tests, though it still checks the household definition and computes the benefit with the usual formula. A household is never categorically eligible if a member is disqualified for an intentional program violation, a drug-related felony covered by the rules, or being a fleeing felon, or if the head of household was disqualified for refusing work requirements, among other cases the regulation lists.
What eligibility is worth
Qualifying does not guarantee a large amount. A household with no net income receives the full maximum, $808 for three in fiscal year 2027; each dollar of net income takes 30 cents off. Run your own figures through the SNAP calculator, which applies your state's line and its utility allowance, or check the maximums in SNAP benefit amounts.