Many retirees reach an important crossroads and ask the same question: What should I do with my Roth IRA after I retire? You worked hard for years to build tax-free savings, and now the goal is to use that Roth IRA in a way that supports your lifestyle, keeps taxes low, and protects long-term security. Roth IRAs are different from Traditional IRAs and most workplace plans because they do not force required minimum distributions (RMDs) during your lifetime and, when rules are met, withdrawals can be tax-free. That flexibility makes the Roth IRA one of the most strategic retirement assets you can own.

At Diversified Insurance Brokers, we help retirees make these decisions every day. Some retirees preserve the Roth IRA as a tax-free “reserve” for later-life expenses or legacy planning. Others convert a portion into predictable income using annuities to reduce market exposure and create a retirement paycheck they can count on. And many retirees combine Roth withdrawals with other income sources to improve tax efficiency across their entire retirement timeline.

Understanding how a Roth IRA works after retirement

Before making big decisions, it helps to restate what makes a Roth IRA special in retirement. A Roth IRA can provide tax-free growth and, when rules are met, tax-free withdrawals. Unlike Traditional IRAs, you are not forced to take required minimum distributions during your lifetime. That means you can withdraw when it benefits you, not when the IRS forces you to. For many retirees, this flexibility turns the Roth IRA into a planning “tool” instead of simply another account.

If you want a refresher on mechanics, see: How Does a Roth IRA Work? That overview helps you anchor your strategy to the actual rules, especially if your Roth IRA includes both contributions and conversions from prior years.

In retirement, Roth IRAs are often used in three roles: a tax-free reserve for large or unexpected expenses, a tax-free “bridge” during years when you want to delay Social Security or limit taxable income, and a legacy asset intended for heirs. Your best role depends on your household income structure, your taxable accounts, and your need for predictable income versus flexibility.

Option 1: Keep the Roth IRA invested and use it strategically

Many retirees choose to leave their Roth IRA invested and treat it as a long-term tax-free growth bucket. When you do not need immediate income from the Roth IRA, the account can continue compounding without tax drag. For retirees with strong guaranteed income elsewhere—such as Social Security, a pension, or annuity income—keeping the Roth invested can be a powerful way to preserve future flexibility.

The tradeoff is volatility. Even though the Roth IRA’s tax status is excellent, the account can still decline if it is invested aggressively. Some retirees are perfectly comfortable with that risk because the Roth is not funding essential expenses. Others prefer to protect at least part of the Roth IRA so it can serve as a stable reserve when markets are down, especially during the first decade of retirement when sequence risk tends to feel the most stressful.

When retirees keep the Roth IRA invested, they often use it for “smart withdrawals” rather than routine spending. For example, they may pull from the Roth in a high-expense year to avoid increasing taxable income, or they may use it to manage how much they withdraw from Traditional IRAs during years when tax brackets matter.

Option 2: Use the Roth IRA as a tax-free flexibility tool

One of the best reasons to keep a Roth IRA intact is that it can provide tax-free liquidity later. Retirement rarely follows a perfect spreadsheet. A home repair, a vehicle purchase, family travel, a medical cost, or a large insurance premium can hit at the wrong time. If all of your “extra money” must come from taxable accounts, a surprise expense can push you into a higher bracket or create a ripple effect in your overall tax picture.

Because the Roth IRA can provide tax-free withdrawals (subject to rules), it can function like a financial shock absorber. Many retirees intentionally preserve the Roth IRA so they have a source of money that will not increase taxable income when life happens.

Even if you do plan to use your Roth IRA, many retirees prefer to avoid turning it into their everyday spending account. Instead, they often fund baseline spending from predictable income sources and use the Roth IRA more selectively. That approach keeps the Roth available for strategic use rather than routine withdrawals.

Option 3: Transfer part of your Roth IRA to an annuity for protection and predictable income

For retirees asking, “What should I do with my Roth IRA after I retire?”, one of the most practical strategies is repositioning part of the Roth IRA into an annuity designed for principal protection and predictable outcomes. This is not an “all-or-nothing” decision. Many retirees keep a portion of the Roth IRA invested for long-term tax-free growth while using another portion to create stability and reliable retirement income.

When a Roth IRA is repositioned into an annuity strategy, the objective is typically one of two outcomes. The first is principal protection and steadier growth (often through a fixed annuity design). The second is predictable lifetime income, where a portion of the Roth IRA is structured to create a retirement paycheck you can count on for life.

The step-by-step rollover process is covered here: How to Transfer a Roth IRA to an Annuity. That guide helps you understand how the transfer is typically handled so the account stays properly titled and the strategy stays aligned with Roth rules.

Retirees often like this approach for a few reasons. It can reduce anxiety around market volatility, it can create a more predictable income structure, and it can simplify budgeting. When the annuity design is used primarily for income, many retirees like knowing that a portion of their retirement paycheck is not tied to daily market movement.

If you want a deeper explanation of how annuities credit interest (and why the crediting method matters), this is a helpful companion page: How Do Annuities Earn Interest?

When guaranteed income can make sense for a Roth IRA

Not every retiree needs Roth IRA income. Many households have enough predictable income from Social Security, pensions, and other sources that the Roth IRA’s best job is tax-free growth or legacy planning. But other retirees are in a different position. They want a “retirement paycheck” that is dependable, and they do not want all of that dependability to come from taxable accounts.

For these retirees, using part of a Roth IRA to create predictable income can provide real peace of mind. It can also reduce pressure on other accounts during downturns because income is not dependent on selling investments at an inconvenient time. The result is often a retirement plan that feels steadier, even if the overall household still maintains investment exposure in other accounts.

If you’re evaluating lifetime income concepts more broadly, this page is a helpful starting point: Do Annuities Pay Income for Life?

Coordinating Roth withdrawals with Social Security, pensions, and Traditional IRAs

Roth IRAs are at their best when they are coordinated with everything else. Many retirees unintentionally create higher taxes by taking distributions from taxable accounts at the wrong times, then “saving the Roth for later” without a clear plan. A smarter approach is to treat the Roth as a strategic lever you can pull when the timing is right.

For example, some retirees use the Roth IRA to fund a few years of spending while delaying Social Security, especially if delaying creates a materially higher lifetime benefit. Others use Roth withdrawals in years where traditional distributions would push taxable income beyond a comfort threshold. Roth withdrawals can also be useful if you have a pension and want to keep taxes predictable rather than stacking multiple taxable income streams in the same year.

If you’re coordinating multiple plan types, these overviews can help you see how other retirement accounts behave in distribution phase: How Does a 457b Work? and How Does a Pension Work?. Those pages often help retirees think about how to sequence income sources without unintentionally stacking taxable income.

Using a Roth IRA as a legacy tool after retirement

For many retirees, the Roth IRA is the last account they want to spend. Because the account can potentially grow tax-free and beneficiaries may receive tax-free distributions (subject to distribution rules), the Roth IRA is often considered one of the best legacy assets in the entire retirement plan. Retirees who are comfortable funding retirement spending from other sources often preserve the Roth IRA for heirs or for later-life expenses when flexibility matters most.

That does not mean the Roth IRA should sit unmanaged. Even a legacy-driven Roth IRA strategy should be aligned to risk tolerance. Some retirees keep the Roth invested with a long-term horizon. Others reposition a portion into protected strategies so the value is less sensitive to market timing, especially if the Roth IRA is intended to serve as a “family safety net.”

How Diversified Insurance Brokers helps you decide what to do with your Roth IRA

Roth IRA decisions are rarely isolated. The best Roth IRA strategy is usually the one that complements your overall income system—your Social Security timing, your pension elections, your Traditional IRA distributions, and your need for predictable monthly income. At Diversified Insurance Brokers, we help retirees compare protected annuity strategies, evaluate income rider designs, and structure retirement income plans that prioritize stability without sacrificing smart flexibility.

Our process is designed to answer the practical retiree questions that actually matter: how much dependable income your household needs, how much liquidity you want, how you want to protect a spouse, and how you want your money to behave during a downturn. Once those priorities are clear, it becomes much easier to decide whether the Roth IRA should remain invested, be preserved as a tax-free reserve, be repositioned for stability, or be used to create predictable tax-advantaged income.