Portugal's Solidarity Top-Up for the Poorest Elderly Hits a Record 245,500 After Dropping the Children's-Income Test

The number of people drawing Portugal's Complemento Solidário para Idosos (Solidarity Supplement for the Elderly, CSI) — the means-tested top-up paid to the country's poorest pensioners — has climbed to 245,500, the highest figure ever recorded, according to the Ministry of Labour, Solidarity and Social Security (Ministério do Trabalho, Solidariedade e Segurança Social).

That is an increase of about 105,000 beneficiaries in just over two years, from roughly 140,000 in April 2024 to 245,500 by June 2026 — a jump of around 75%. The ministry credits the surge to a package of changes designed to widen access and lift the amounts paid, in a country where old-age poverty remains stubbornly common.

The change that opened the door

The single biggest reason more people now qualify is a reform of the condição de recursos (means test). Until recently, the income of a claimant's adult children was folded into the calculation, so a pensioner with modestly earning children could be pushed above the threshold and denied support. That family-income rule has been dropped for both new awards and reassessments, removing a barrier that critics had long called perverse.

The supplement is aimed at low-income residents of pension age — currently 66 years and nine months — who have lived in Portugal long enough to meet a six-year residence requirement. It tops a pensioner's income up toward a reference value that has itself risen sharply, from €550.70 a year in 2024 to €670 now — the equivalent of an €8,040 annual floor.

Bigger cheques, and free medicines

The payments are also growing heavier. More than half of all beneficiaries now receive over €200 a month, and one in five collects more than €300. The count of those getting at least €200 monthly nearly tripled, from 45,000 to about 132,000. Beyond the cash, the CSI unlocks a bundle of extras — most valuably, subsidised prescriptions: more than 220,000 seniors used the scheme to access free or heavily discounted medicines in 2026.

The trend continues a steady climb the supplement has shown for months. It stood at 239,771 beneficiaries in March, and the reference value is legislated to keep rising toward €870 by 2029.

What this means for expats

• Older residents on thin pensions should check eligibility: the CSI is not limited to Portuguese nationals — long-term legal residents who meet the residence and income tests can apply, and the scrapped children's-income rule means more households now clear the bar.
• The medicine subsidy can matter as much as the cash: for pensioners with chronic conditions, the free-prescription benefit attached to the CSI is often worth more than the monthly top-up itself.
• It sits alongside a wider welfare overhaul: the government is separately folding thirteen benefits into a single payment from late 2026, so the support landscape for low-income residents is shifting on several fronts at once.

A record caseload is, in one sense, good news badly disguised: it means more of Portugal's poorest older people are finally reaching help they were entitled to. It is also a reminder of how many were kept out by a rule that counted their children's wages against them. On what happens when an adult can no longer manage their own affairs, our guide to the maior acompanhado, the regime that replaced interdição in 2018, under which a judge must meet the person face to face, the measures are limited to what is necessary, and the file is reviewed at least every five years sets the latest reference.