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Accounts in Portugal

Every kind of account and pension the planner offers in Portugal: what each one is, when money can come out, how it is taxed, and the pages we read the rules from.

Engine 2026Reviewed

Outside the state pension, Portuguese savings sit mostly in bank deposits, the state's savings certificates (Certificados de Aforro and Certificados do Tesouro), investment funds and the retirement savings plan (PPR). Portugal has no tax-free investment account, so the money step offers two rows: the ordinary account and the PPR, the one place where only the growth is taxed, at a low rate.

An annuity bought from an insurer, a workplace pension or a pension from abroad pays you an income instead, so it goes in the pension step, with its kind.

Rules as of the 2026 tax year, read from the authorities on 2026-07-27. Each account lists the pages we read it from.

Accounts you can enter

A new plan starts with 94% in Investment account, 6% in PPR retirement savings plan, until you replace it with your own accounts. Where that split comes from: Banco de Portugal and INE, household finance survey 2024.

Investment account

Profit is taxed at a flat rate when you sell, and the longer you have held something the less of the profit counts. Nothing is due while an accumulating fund grows. Savings insurance and deposits go here too.

Funds, shares, bonds, deposits and savings certificates held at a bank or broker. The plan treats it as funds that reinvest what they earn: nothing is taxed while it grows, and the profit when you sell is taxed at 28%, of which only 70% counts, the share for something held more than eight years.

Interest on deposits and savings certificates is really taxed at 28% every year it is paid. The plan does not charge that yearly tax, which is listed with the tax page's simplifications.

How it is taxed, rate by rate, is on the tax page.

In the withdrawal orders
With the ordinary accounts
Pays out
Whenever you like
At the first death
Your partner takes it over, and the gain built up in it is wiped for tax

PPR retirement savings plan

What you paid in comes back untaxed. The growth in what you take out is taxed at 8% from 60, and at up to 21.5% before. A PEPP or Retirement Certificates go here too.

A PPR (plano de poupança-reforma) is Portugal's personal retirement savings plan, sold by banks and insurers as a fund or as insurance. Retirement Certificates (Certificados de Reforma, the state's voluntary top-up scheme) and a pan-European personal pension (PEPP) follow the same rules on the way out.

Each withdrawal is part what you paid in and part growth, in the same proportion as the whole plan. What you paid in comes back untaxed. From 60 the growth is taxed at a flat 8% (20% on two fifths of it), apart from your other income. Before 60 it is 21.5%, lowered after five and eight years for a plan where at least 35% of the money went in during the first half of its life, which is what the planner's questions about the plan's age are for. Growth on money paid in before 2006 is taxed on one fifth instead of two, so at 4%.

Nothing stops you drawing before 60: the plan just charges the higher rate. In law, retiring also qualifies for the 8%, but the plan only checks your age. It treats every payment in as old enough to qualify, and never takes back the tax credit you got on what you paid in.

In the withdrawal orders
With the ordinary accounts
Pays out
Whenever you like
At the first death
Your partner takes it over as it stands
What the planner asks about it
  • Share paid in before 2006 From 0% to 100%. We assume 0%.
  • Most paid in early Off unless you turn it on.
  • Years since the plan began From 0 to 60 years. We assume 0 years.
Where the model simplifies

  • A PPR, Retirement Certificates and a pan-European personal pension (PEPP) are their own account. What you paid in comes back untaxed; the growth inside what you take out is taxed at 8 percent from 60, and at up to 21.5 percent before. What we simplify: we treat every payment in as old enough to qualify, we never take back the tax relief you got on the way in, and we treat Retirement Certificates as reachable before your state pension starts. A PPR paid as regular income should be entered with your pensions.

    Could go either way/anyone holding a PPR, Retirement Certificates or a PEPP

The law behind it
EBF art. 21.o n.os 3 b) and 5, art. 17.o n.o 2, art. 21.o n.o 11; CIRS art. 5.o n.o 3

Kinds of pension

A pension paid to you as an income goes in the pension step, not here. Choose its kind there and the plan taxes it by that kind's rules; leave it on standard and it is taxed like a state or workplace pension.

Annuity bought from an insurer (renda vitalícia)

15% of each payment is taxed, because the rest counts as your own money coming back.

An income for life or for a set term, bought from an insurer with your own savings. When the insurer does not split each payment into your money and its income, the law counts 85% as your money coming back. If your insurer does state a split, that split applies in law, but the planner cannot take it. Unlike a pension, this income does not get the fixed deduction pensions get.

Where the model simplifies

  • When an annuity you bought, or a workplace pension you paid into from taxed pay, gives you back your own money, Portugal taxes only the part that is not that money. If the insurer or fund states that split, the stated split applies. We cannot take that figure from you, so we always use the fallback the law sets when no split is stated: 15 percent of each payment is taxed. If your provider states a larger taxable part we show too little tax, and a smaller one too much.

    Could go either way/anyone with a purchased annuity or a workplace pension built from taxed contributions whose provider states the capital part

The law behind it
CIRS art. 11.o n.o 1 d) (rendas temporarias ou vitalicias are category H); art. 54.o n.os 1-2 ('Quando a parte correspondente ao capital nao puder ser discriminada, a totalidade da renda abate-se ... uma importancia igual a 85 %'); art. 53.o n.o 7 (no art. 53.o n.o 1 deduction for rendas that do not pay art. 11.o n.o 1 a)-c) pensions)

Pension from abroad

Taxed in full as pension income.

A pension paid from abroad, where what was paid in was not taxed in Portugal when it was made. If you still hold the old non-habitual resident status (NHR), it is taxed at a much lower rate, which the plan does not model.

Where the model simplifies

  • Portugal's non-habitual resident scheme (NHR) charges a flat 10 percent on a pension from abroad for ten years, and nothing at all for the earliest arrivals. It closed to new entrants in 2024 and those already inside keep it up to the 2033 income year. We never ask, so if you are one of them the tax we show is far too high, two or three times what you would really pay. Its replacement does not cover pensions.

    Your real tax is lower/anyone registered under Portugal's former resident scheme before 2024 who draws a pension from abroad

The law behind it
CIRS art. 11.o n.o 1 a)-b) and art. 54.o n.os 3-4; AT binding ruling 3874/2018 (despacho 2019-05-09) section 8 (periodic payments from a foreign employer plan are category H, the whole payment where contributions were not taxed on entry)

Workplace pension built from taxed contributions

15% of each payment is taxed, because the contributions that built it were taxed already.

A pension from a pension fund or group insurance whose contributions were taxed as your pay when they were made. As with a bought annuity, 85% of each payment counts as your own money unless the fund states a split. Unlike a bought annuity, it gets the fixed deduction pensions get.

Where the model simplifies

  • When an annuity you bought, or a workplace pension you paid into from taxed pay, gives you back your own money, Portugal taxes only the part that is not that money. If the insurer or fund states that split, the stated split applies. We cannot take that figure from you, so we always use the fallback the law sets when no split is stated: 15 percent of each payment is taxed. If your provider states a larger taxable part we show too little tax, and a smaller one too much.

    Could go either way/anyone with a purchased annuity or a workplace pension built from taxed contributions whose provider states the capital part

The law behind it
CIRS art. 11.o n.o 1 b); art. 54.o n.o 1 ('prestacoes pagas no ambito de regimes complementares de seguranca social qualificadas como pensoes'), n.o 2 (85% abated when the capital part cannot be discriminated), n.os 3-4 (no abatement only where the contributions were borne by someone else and not taxed in the beneficiary); art. 2.o n.o 3 b) 3) i) (employer contributions with acquired, individualised rights are category A of the worker)

Where other things you hold go

Certificados de Aforro, Certificados do Tesouro and bank deposits
Enter them in the ordinary account. Their interest is taxed at 28% each year in law, which the plan does not charge while you hold them.
Savings insurance and unit-linked policies (seguros de capitalização)
Enter them in the ordinary account. The law taxes their growth at 28%, falling to 11.2% after eight years for a policy where enough was paid in early, so for an older policy we show too much tax.
A PPR or pension fund paid to you as a regular income
Enter the income in the pension step as a standard pension. It is taxed as pension income, on your income scale.

New rules not in the model yet

A savings and investment account
Portugal's market regulator (CMVM) handed the government a proposal for a savings and investment account in September 2026, and a bill for a tax-free account was tabled in parliament in June 2026. Neither is law, so the plan uses today's rules.