Housing Benefit for Pensioners 2026 in Germany's 50 Largest Cities: Up to €192 a Month Apart

• Up to €192 a month apart: On a gross pension of €1,100, a single pensioner can receive up to €400 in Munich (rent level VII) but only up to €208 in Chemnitz (rent level I). That is €2,304 a year.
• At €1,700, the city decides whether there is any benefit at all: Munich still pays €71, the 20 cities in rent levels I to III pay nothing. The income limit for single pensioners ranges from a gross pension of €1,612 in Chemnitz to €1,807 in Munich.
• Couples: With a combined gross pension of €1,800, couples receive between €151 (Chemnitz) and €339 (Munich). At €2,200 they get nothing in Chemnitz and €136 in Munich. Above a combined €2,440 there is no benefit in any of the 50 cities.
• Most large cities sit in the middle: 28 of the 50 cities are in rent level III or IV, including Berlin and Bremen (IV) and Dortmund, Essen and Dresden (III). Leipzig is even in level II. Only Munich reaches level VII; nine cities such as Hamburg, Cologne, Frankfurt am Main, Düsseldorf and Stuttgart are in level VI.
• Income tax and basic pension periods raise the benefit markedly: Pensioners who pay income tax get a 20 % instead of a 10 % flat deduction. On €1,300 in Munich the benefit then rises from €294 to €370. With 33 years of basic pension periods (Grundrentenzeiten) it is €459, and Wohngeld is paid up to a gross pension of €2,120.

• Rent level VII (1 city): Munich
• Rent level VI (9 cities): Hamburg, Cologne, Frankfurt am Main, Düsseldorf, Stuttgart, Wiesbaden, Freiburg im Breisgau, Mainz, Darmstadt
• Rent level V (6 cities): Nuremberg, Hanover, Bonn, Mannheim, Augsburg, Kiel
• Rent level IV (14 cities): Berlin, Bremen, Karlsruhe, Münster, Aachen, Braunschweig, Krefeld, Lübeck, Potsdam, Oldenburg, Ludwigshafen am Rhein, Mülheim an der Ruhr, Leverkusen, Osnabrück
• Rent level III (14 cities): Dortmund, Essen, Dresden, Duisburg, Bochum, Wuppertal, Bielefeld, Mönchengladbach, Magdeburg, Halle (Saale), Erfurt, Rostock, Kassel, Saarbrücken
• Rent level II (5 cities): Leipzig, Gelsenkirchen, Oberhausen, Hagen, Hamm
• Rent level I (1 city): Chemnitz

• Income tax: If income tax is paid on the pension, the housing benefit office deducts a flat 20 % instead of 10 % (§ 16 WoGG). Whether tax is due depends mainly on the year the pension started and on other income. With the tax deduction, the income limit for single pensioners ranges from €1,812 (rent level I) to €2,032 (rent level VII).
• Basic pension periods: Anyone with at least 33 years of Grundrentenzeiten, mainly compulsory contribution years from employment plus periods of child-raising and caregiving, gets an allowance of €100 plus 30 % of the pension above that, capped at €281.50 a month (§ 17a WoGG). The cap is reached from a gross pension of about €800 at the latest. A basic pension supplement (Grundrentenzuschlag) does not have to be paid; the periods are what count.
• Severe disability: With a degree of disability of 100, or a lower degree combined with a need for care at home or in day care, a further €1,800 a year is deducted (§ 17 WoGG).
• Lower rent: If the gross cold rent is below the cap including the climate component, only the actual rent counts and the benefit is lower. Your personal amount is shown by the Housing Benefit Calculator.

• Cities: the 50 most populous cities according to the Federal Statistical Office's municipal register (population on 31 December 2024, based on the 2022 census). The figures for 31 December 2025 give the same 50 cities.
• Rent level: annex to § 1(3) of the Housing Benefit Ordinance, “rent levels of municipalities by state from 1 January 2023”. The assignment was not changed when the benefit rose on 1 January 2025 and still applies in 2026.
• Income: statutory pension only, no other income. For Wohngeld the full gross pension counts, including the tax-free portion (§ 14 WoGG). Deducted are the flat allowance for income-related expenses of €102 a year (§ 9a Income Tax Act) and a flat 10 % for health and long-term care insurance contributions (§ 16 WoGG). In couples, both partners draw a pension.
• Rent: the gross cold rent at least reaches the cap of the rent level including the climate component (§ 12(7) WoGG), so the figures are the maximum possible benefit with a sufficiently high rent. The heating relief under § 12(6) WoGG is added to the counted rent.
• Calculation: benefit formula of § 19 WoGG with the values of Annexes 1 to 3 as in force since 1 January 2025, rounded to whole euros. No benefit is paid below €10 (§ 21 WoGG). No substantial assets are assumed. The income limit is the highest gross pension in whole euros that still yields at least €10, found by a step-by-step search with the same calculation.
• Check: the calculation is the one used in our housing benefit calculator. It reproduces the official 2025 worked example of the Federal Ministry for Housing (a pensioner with a gross pension of €1,300, rent level I, €335 gross cold rent: €110 Wohngeld).
• Not included: company pensions and other income, households with more than two people and the burden subsidy for owners. All figures are model calculations; the housing benefit office decides in each case.

The study can be regenerated each year with a script in this website's source code: node apps/rechnerportal/scripts/data/wohngeld-rentner-staedte.mjs (Node.js 22.18 or later). It writes the tables in this article and the CSV file.

• Housing Benefit Act (WoGG), §§ 12 to 19, 21, 25, 43 and Annexes 1 to 3, last amended 16 April 2026, retrieved 26 October 2026
• Housing Benefit Ordinance, annex to § 1(3): rent levels of municipalities, retrieved 26 October 2026
• § 9a Income Tax Act: flat allowances for income-related expenses
• Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs: standard needs from 1 January 2026 (standard needs level 1: €563, basis of the cap under § 17a WoGG)
• Federal Statistical Office: cities by area, population and density on 31 December 2024
• Federal Ministry for Housing, Urban Development and Building: worked examples for Wohngeld from 1 January 2025
• German Bundestag: simplification and further development of the Housing Benefit Act, first reading on 8 October 2026 and document 21/8284

Download all figures as a CSV file (350 rows: 50 cities × 7 scenarios, with rent level, cap, counted rent, countable income, benefit, income limit and the variants with income tax and basic pension periods; German column names, semicolon separator, decimal comma, UTF-8).