Social Security Phone Wait Times: The Best Times to Call
The Social Security Administration receives 80 million calls every year. Timing is everything if you want to get through.


No one likes to hang on the phone waiting for assistance; when the issue at hand is vital, such as maintaining your Social Security retirement or disability benefits, the stress and aggravation can make the situation worse. The best thing to do in this case is to prepare before calling the Social Security Administration (SSA) or filing a new claim for benefits so you'll know what to expect.
Announcements regarding workforce reductions, the consolidation and closing of in-person hearing offices at the SSA and the desire to move more customer service transactions online have some older Americans concerned about getting in touch with the SSA when they need to.
The data available on the Social Security website can give you the information you need to better time a phone call and to steel yourself for long wait times. In March 2025, the average amount of time a caller waited on hold to speak to a representative in English was 1 hour, 39 minutes.

Sign up for Kiplinger’s Free E-Newsletters
Profit and prosper with the best of expert advice on investing, taxes, retirement, personal finance and more - straight to your e-mail.
Profit and prosper with the best of expert advice - straight to your e-mail.
Best times to call the Social Security Administration
The SSA typically receives 80 million calls each year to its national 800 phone number. Based on the average daily call volume data from April 2023 to March 2025, the SSA received its greatest number of calls in March 2025, with 10,428,157 calls for the month, averaging 483,549 calls per day. The second busiest month was January 2025, when they received 9,777,109, averaging 448,423 calls per day.
The passage of the Social Security Fairness Act resulted in a surge in calls to the SSA. Although they added a recorded message about the Act to the menu of automated services, more than 6,000 people each day still choose to wait to speak to a representative about the Act.
You can call the SSA at 1-800-772-1213 from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. local time, Monday through Friday. Wait times to speak to a representative are typically shorter in the morning, later in the week, and later in the month. Mondays are the busiest, and Fridays have shorter wait times, with the exception of the end of the day, when wait times steadily build to almost two hours by 5 p.m.
If you want to review the average wait times for every weekday for every hour from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m., visit the Contact Social Security By Phone webpage to see the full breakdown.
Day | Best time to call before 12 | Best time to call after 12 | Worst time to call |
---|---|---|---|
Monday | 8 a.m.: average wait time is 25 minutes | 1 p.m.: average wait time is 1 hour, 32 minutes | 6 p.m.: average wait time is 2 hours, 27 minutes. At 7 p.m.: average wait time is 2 hours, 24 minutes |
Tuesday | 8 a.m.: average wait time is 24 minutes | 1 p.m.: average wait time is 1 hour, 37 minutes | 3 p.m.: average wait time is 2 hours, 3 minutes |
Wednesday | 8 a.m.: average wait time is 22 minute | 1 p.m.: average wait time is 1 hour, 26 minutes | 7 p.m.: average wait time is 2 hours, 4 minutes |
Thursday | 8 a.m.: average wait time is 21 minute | 1 p.m.: average wait time is 1 hour, 20 minutes | 7 p.m.: average wait time is 2 hours, 5 minutes |
Friday | 8 a.m.: average wait time is 21 minute | 1 p.m.: average wait time is 1 hour, 8 minutes | 7 p.m.: average wait time is 2 hours, 15 minutes |
Automated telephone services are available 24 hours a day and do not require you to wait to speak with a representative.
Average call wait and callback time trends
Average wait times predictably ticked up in January after the passage of the Social Security Fairness Act in late December, as demonstrated in the graph below. Wait times surged from 1 hour, 34 minutes to 1 hour, 52 minutes in January. Wait times slowly improved to 1 hour, 44 minutes in February and ticked down again by 5 minutes in March. to 1 hour, 39 minutes.
If you don't want to hang on the line, you can opt to have a representative call you back. The average amount of time a caller waited to receive a callback from a representative hasn't changed much from September 2024 to March 2025.
The shortest callback time in that period was in October 2024, when callers only waited 1 hour, 49 minutes for a callback. The longest wait was in January 2025, with an average wait time of 2 hours, 31 minutes; in March 2025, callback times were not much better at 2 hours, 30 minutes.
Bottom line
The SSA doesn't miss an opportunity to remind beneficiaries that the wait time for online services is zero minutes. If you need a bigger push to open a my Social Security account, here's a list of 15 Social Security tasks you can do online. These include applying for benefits, changing your direct deposit information and requesting a replacement Social Security or Medicare card.
Related Content
Profit and prosper with the best of Kiplinger's advice on investing, taxes, retirement, personal finance and much more. Delivered daily. Enter your email in the box and click Sign Me Up.

Donna joined Kiplinger as a personal finance writer in 2023. She spent more than a decade as the contributing editor of J.K.Lasser's Your Income Tax Guide and edited state specific legal treatises at ALM Media. She has shared her expertise as a guest on Bloomberg, CNN, Fox, NPR, CNBC and many other media outlets around the nation. She is a graduate of Brooklyn Law School and the University at Buffalo.
-
Don’t Let Your Dreams Go Unfulfilled: Plan for Your Passion in Retirement
Follow these three steps to ensure you are emotionally and financially prepared for your passion in retirement.
-
I Heard Tariffs Will Cost Families $2,800 This Year. I'm a Retiree on a Fixed Income. How Can I Prepare?
We ask retirement planning experts what to do.
-
Don’t Let Your Dreams Go Unfulfilled: Plan for Your Passion in Retirement
Follow these three steps to ensure you are emotionally and financially prepared for your passion in retirement.
-
I Heard Tariffs Will Cost Families $2,800 This Year. I'm a Retiree on a Fixed Income. How Can I Prepare?
We ask retirement planning experts what to do.
-
I'm an Estate Planning Attorney: These Are the Two Legal Documents Everyone Should Have
Every adult should have a health care proxy and power of attorney — they save loved ones time, money and stress if a sudden illness or injury leaves you incapacitated.
-
Does Happiness Improve at Age 50? Maybe Not for Everyone
New thinking about how happiness changes over our lifetimes shows that one group in particular gains the most contentment after age 50.
-
Six Big Beautiful Opportunities: Advisers' Guide to Tax and Client Strategies
Here are several ways financial professionals can help their clients maximize opportunities in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which extends key TCJA provisions, introduces increased deductions for people 65 and older and more.
-
How to Guard Against the New Generation of Fraud and Identity Theft
Fraud and identity theft are getting more sophisticated and harder to spot. Stay ahead of the scammers with our advice.
-
The Retirement Bucket Rule: Your Guide to Fear-Free Spending
Forget market declines or rising inflation. With this strategy, you won’t have to worry about any of that during retirement.
-
Plan for Higher Health Care Costs in 2026: Projected Medicare Part B and Part D Premiums
In 2026, Medicare participants will pay more for their health care. Part B costs are expected to rise more than 10%. Here's what you can do.