5 Ways to Supercharge Your Retirement Savings While You're Still Working
From HSAs to backdoor Roths and even humble taxable brokerage accounts, there are plenty of ways to boost retirement savings once you've hit your full 401(k) match.
If you're already contributing enough to capture your full 401(k) match, you've got the basics covered. The bigger opportunities — and the ones I see even diligent savers miss — are found a level up from there.
After more than a decade of helping people build their retirement plans as a CFP® professional, I've found that most people stop optimizing right after the match.
Other savings accounts and strategies that could work in their favor go unused for years, not because they're complicated, but because nobody ever walked through them step by step.
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Here are five that can make a meaningful difference for people who are already saving well and want to do more.
1. Take advantage of an HSA's triple tax benefits
If you're eligible to contribute to a health savings account (HSA), it may be the most underused account you have.
HSAs offer a rare triple tax advantage: Contributions can be made pretax or may be deductible, earnings grow tax-free, and withdrawals are tax-free when used for qualified medical expenses.
For 2026, you can contribute up to $4,400 for self-only coverage or $8,750 for family coverage, plus another $1,000 if you're 55 or older.
Most people treat their HSA like a checking account for copays and prescriptions. You don't have to. You can pay medical costs out of pocket now, let the HSA grow untouched for decades and reimburse yourself years later, as long as the expenses were incurred after you established the HSA, weren't previously reimbursed or deducted and you kept adequate records.
I've worked with people in their 50s who'd been quietly saving old medical receipts for this exact reason, without ever calling it a strategy. Used that way, an HSA functions like one of the most tax-advantaged retirement accounts you have access to, not just a place to park money for copays.
2. Choose pretax or Roth in your 401(k) on purpose
Most people never actively decide between pretax and Roth contributions. Their 401(k) defaults to whatever the plan set up on day one, and they never revisit it. I've reviewed plans for people who hadn't looked at this choice in over a decade, even though their income, and the right answer for them, had changed completely in that time.
The difference matters. Pretax contributions generally reduce your taxable income now, while withdrawals are generally taxed as ordinary income later. Meanwhile, Roth contributions don't provide a current deduction, but qualified withdrawals are tax-free.
A useful starting point is to compare your marginal tax rate today with the rate you reasonably expect when the money is withdrawn. Keep in mind future required minimum distributions (RMDs), tax-law uncertainty, and the value of having both taxable and tax-free income sources in retirement.
For 2026, the 401(k) employee deferral limit is $24,500, with an additional $8,000 available if you're 50 or older.
One change worth flagging for this year: If your 2025 FICA wages from the employer sponsoring the plan exceeded $150,000, your 2026 catch-up contributions generally must be made as Roth contributions. It's a rule that's easy to miss.
There's no universal right answer here, only the one that fits your specific tax situation. Modeling your expected income and tax bracket in retirement with a retirement planning tool can help you make that call instead of guessing. (Note: I'm head of support and a financial planning educator at Boldin.) Make it a real decision, not a default.
3. Look into a mega backdoor Roth if you still have room to save
This one is for higher earners who've maxed out the accounts above and still have money left over to put away.
If your 401(k) plan allows after-tax contributions, separate from Roth contributions, you may be able to save well beyond the standard deferral limit. For 2026, the combined 401(k) employee-and-employer contribution limit is $72,000, or 100% of your compensation if less.
Catch-up contributions generally sit on top of that limit, potentially bringing the total to $80,000 if you're 50 or older, or $83,250 if you qualify for the higher age-60-to-63 "super" catch-up.
Once you've maxed your regular deferral and accounted for any employer contributions, the remaining room can sometimes be filled with after-tax dollars, then converted to Roth, either through an in-plan conversion or an in-service rollover to a Roth IRA.
This only works if your plan specifically permits both after-tax contributions and one of those conversion paths, so call your HR department or plan administrator before assuming it's available. Not every plan offers it, but for the people it fits, it's one of the more overlooked ways to build tax-free savings.
4. Stack a backdoor Roth IRA on top of your mega backdoor Roth
If you've just read about the mega backdoor Roth and assumed you've now used up your Roth options for the year, you haven't.
A backdoor Roth IRA lets high earners get money into a Roth IRA even after they've been phased out of contributing directly. You contribute to a traditional IRA on a non-deductible basis, then convert it to Roth shortly after. For 2026, the IRA contribution limit is $7,500, plus $1,100 more if you're 50 or older.
Here's the part I get asked about constantly: Your IRA contribution limit is separate from the limits that apply to your workplace plan. If you're otherwise eligible for each strategy, you can fund a backdoor Roth IRA and execute a mega backdoor Roth in the same year.
The one thing that can complicate a backdoor Roth IRA is the IRS's pro-rata rule, which requires you to consider all of your traditional, SEP and SIMPLE IRA balances together when calculating the tax on a conversion.
The calculation looks at the year-end value of all of those IRAs, not just the account holding your nondeductible contribution.
A mega backdoor Roth, whether converted inside your workplace plan or rolled directly to a Roth IRA, generally doesn't count toward those IRA balances.
If you don't have pretax traditional, SEP or SIMPLE IRA money sitting around, the backdoor Roth IRA stays clean from a tax standpoint. Either strategy can have tax consequences, so confirm the details with your CPA before you move any money.
5. Don't underestimate a plain taxable brokerage account
After three accounts built around tax breaks and rules, a taxable brokerage account can feel almost boring by comparison. But it doesn't get nearly enough credit.
There's no statutory contribution limit, no income cap and no early withdrawal penalty. You can invest as much as you want and sell investments or withdraw cash whenever you want, although selling appreciated investments can create a taxable gain.
That flexibility is rare among the accounts on this list, especially if you're hoping to retire before 59½ and need a bridge to cover expenses before your retirement accounts are penalty-free.
The tax treatment isn't as generous as a Roth or an HSA, but it's still better than most people assume. Long-term capital gains and qualified dividends get preferential rates, not your ordinary income rate.
For 2026, the 0% federal long-term capital gains bracket for married couples filing jointly extends through $98,900 of taxable income. Ordinary taxable income uses that bracket first, so only gains that fall within the remaining space qualify for the 0% rate.
There's also tax-loss harvesting: Selling an investment at a loss to offset capital gains and potentially up to $3,000 of ordinary income, subject to rules such as the wash-sale rule, something you simply can't do inside a 401(k) or IRA.
I've worked with many who treat their brokerage account as an afterthought, something they'll "get to eventually" once the tax-advantaged accounts are maxed. Fund it on purpose instead, particularly if flexibility and access before retirement age matter to your plan.
These add up faster than you'd think
Some of these moves require additional savings, while others change the tax treatment or destination of money you're already saving. The goal is to direct each additional dollar toward the account that best supports your plan.
That distinction compounds. A few percentage points redirected toward a Roth or an HSA in your 50s can mean a different tax bill in your 70s and 80s.
I've watched people run these strategies side by side and see for themselves how much of a difference the right combination makes over 20 or 30 years.
You don't need to implement all five at once. Start by identifying which strategies are available to you, then prioritize the one that best fits your tax situation, savings capacity and need for flexibility.
Before you know it, you will be on your way to a confident retirement knowing that you have optimized your savings.
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