CHARITY BUNCHING PLANNER · RUNS IN YOUR BROWSER · NOTHING UPLOADED

Which years should I bunch my charitable giving?

If your deductions are usually below the standard deduction, your giving earns no tax benefit. Funding a donor-advised fund with several years of gifts in one year can lift that year over the line, while the charities still receive the same amount every year. Enter what you give and your deductions, and the tool searches every schedule of deposit years over your horizon, models the 0.5%-of-AGI floor and the direct-cash deduction for non-itemizers, and shows the schedule that saves the most next to giving directly every year.

Planning arithmetic on numbers you type in. Not legal, tax or financial advice. The example figures are placeholders, not a recommendation or a real person.

1. Your giving and deductions

Questions people ask

Does bunching charitable gifts into one year really save tax?

It can. You only get a tax benefit from itemizing for the part of your itemized deductions that is above the standard deduction. If your usual itemized total is below it, a normal year of giving earns nothing. Putting several years of gifts into one year, usually through a donor-advised fund, pushes that year well over the standard deduction, and in the years in between you take the standard deduction. The charities still get the same amount a year, because the fund grants it out on your schedule.

What changed for charitable deductions in 2026?

Under the 2025 tax law, itemizers can only deduct charitable gifts above a floor of 0.5% of adjusted gross income, and people who take the standard deduction can deduct up to a set amount of direct cash gifts (the tool asks you to type the cap for your filing status). Gifts to a donor-advised fund do not count for the non-itemizer deduction. Both rules change the best schedule, which is why the tool models them. Check the current figures; the tool embeds none.

Why does the plan have me give directly in the off years?

In a year you take the standard deduction, a direct cash gift to a charity up to the cap is still deductible, and a deposit to a donor-advised fund is not. So in the covered years the plan has you send that amount directly, and the fund grants only the rest. It does not change what the charity receives.

How long should I bunch for?

There is no universal answer, which is why the tool searches every schedule up to the longest gap you allow and ranks the regular cycles beside it. Longer gaps push more into one year but delay the money reaching charities and put more of the deduction in a single tax year, where a flat rate may overstate the saving because a large deduction can fall through tax brackets.

What about giving appreciated stock?

If part of a deposit is funded with stock you have held more than a year, you can deduct its value and avoid the capital-gains tax you would pay by selling it first. Enter the share of deposits in stock, the share of that stock that is gain, and your long-term rate, and the tool reports the gain tax avoided. The deduction for stock has its own, lower AGI limit that the tool does not model.

Is this tax or financial advice?

No. It is arithmetic on the numbers you type, with one flat tax rate, one filing status and no alternative minimum tax. A deposit to a donor-advised fund is irrevocable. Confirm the plan with a tax adviser before you commit money.

Not decided

Your actual tax: one flat rate is used, so a large bunched deduction that really falls through several brackets is overstated; alternative minimum tax; the phase-out or cap on the benefit of itemized deductions for high earners; the lower AGI limit for gifts of appreciated stock and the five-year carryforward of excess gifts; state rules; fund fees and minimums; and the fact that a deposit to a donor-advised fund is irrevocable. Charitable giving is worth doing for its own sake; this only times it.

Related tools: the charitable deduction calculator for a single year under the new rules, the tax lot sale optimizer for choosing which shares to give or sell, and the Roth conversion bracket-fill calculator for another deduction-timing decision.