Per the Federal Reserve's 2022 Survey of Consumer Finances — the most recently published triennial survey — the median U.S. family held $8,000 across transaction accounts (checking, savings, money market, and prepaid accounts combined), while the mean (average) was $62,500. The mean sits far above the median because a small share of high-balance households pulls the average up; the median better reflects a typical household.
"Average savings" gets cited two very different ways, and the gap between them is enormous. The most authoritative source is the Federal Reserve's Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF) — a triennial survey of U.S. household finances, most recently published for 2022 data in October 2023 as "Changes in U.S. Family Finances from 2019 to 2022."
The SCF measures "transaction accounts" — checking accounts, savings accounts, money market accounts, call accounts, and prepaid debit cards combined, not savings accounts alone. For families that held a transaction account in 2022, the Fed reported a conditional median value of $8,000 and a conditional mean value of $62,500. The Fed's report also notes transaction accounts were the most commonly held financial asset in 2022, with a 98.6% ownership rate among families.
A median is the middle value — half of families have more, half have less. A mean (average) adds up every family's balance and divides by the number of families, which means it's heavily skewed upward by a relatively small number of households with very large balances. Wealth in the U.S. is concentrated: a modest number of high-balance families pull the mean far above where a typical household actually sits. For that reason, the median is the more representative figure for "what does a typical American have," while the mean better answers "what's the total pool of transaction-account money divided evenly."
Because the SCF figure combines checking, savings, money market, and prepaid balances into one "transaction account" total, it overstates what's specifically sitting in a dedicated savings account for most families — a chunk of that $8,000 median is likely everyday checking balance, not money set aside as savings. The SCF is also the most rigorous nationally representative source available, conducted directly by the Federal Reserve rather than a bank-reported or self-reported online survey.
Wherever your own balance sits relative to these figures, moving idle checking or low-rate savings into a rate-competitive account is a purely mechanical improvement. See our best high-yield savings accounts guide or compare live rates at ClearValue Banking.
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