2025 Form 5500 Series Informational Copies Released

The Department of Labor’s Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA), the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) jointly released the 2025 Form 5500, Annual Return/Report of Employee Benefit Plan, the 2025 Form 5500-SF, Short Form Annual Return/Report of Small Employee Benefit Plan, and their respective instructions and schedules. 

The release also includes the 2025 Form 5500-EZ, Annual Return of A One-Participant (Owners/Partners and Their Spouses) Retirement Plan or A Foreign Plan, and Form 5558 and their related instructions. The IRS will release paper copies of the 2025 Form 5500-EZ and its instructions separately and provide the form’s instructions on the agency’s website after Jan. 1, 2026.

EBSA highlights the following changes for 2025.

• New plan characteristic codes, 1J, 1K, and 1L added to Form 5500 for use in identifying multiemployer defined benefit plans terminated as a result of mass withdrawal, plan amendment or insolvency.
• New plan characteristic code, 1G, added for use on both forms to identify defined benefit plans that use a variable annuity benefit formula.
• Existing plan characteristic code 1H modified on Form 5500 to clarify that it applies only to terminated single-employer PBGC-covered plans.

Filers are reminded that information copies cannot be used for filing. Official electronic versions will be available at a later date.