Form 5498 Box 2: What Counts as a Rollover Contribution

Box 2 on Form 5498 reports the total dollar amount of rollover contributions your IRA received during the calendar year, including money moved in from another IRA or from an employer plan such as a 401(k), 403(b), or 457(b). Because that money was already sitting in a tax-advantaged retirement account, it isn’t taxable, and it doesn’t count against the annual IRA contribution limit that governs Box 1. Your IRA custodian files the form with the IRS and sends you a copy, creating the paper trail that confirms the funds stayed inside the retirement system instead of becoming a taxable withdrawal.

What Box 2 Counts

The IRS instructions for the 2025 Form 5498 define Box 2 as showing “rollover contributions, including direct rollover contributions” made to the IRA during the year.¹ Two kinds of transactions land in this box:

Direct rollovers, where money moves straight from one plan trustee to another (for example, your former employer’s 401(k) sends the check directly to your new IRA custodian).
Indirect rollovers, where you personally receive a distribution and redeposit it into an IRA within 60 days.

A direct rollover from an employer plan is reported by the sending plan on Form 1099-R with distribution code G, and the receiving IRA custodian picks it up in Box 2.²

What Doesn’t Go in Box 2

Several transactions that look like rollovers are reported somewhere else on Form 5498, or not on the form at all. If you’re checking Box 2 and something you expected to see is missing, one of these is usually why.

Roth conversions. Moving money from a traditional or SIMPLE IRA to a Roth IRA is reported in Box 3, not Box 2.¹
Late rollovers accepted under a waiver. If you missed the 60-day window but qualified through self-certification or an IRS private letter ruling, the custodian reports the amount in Box 13a.³
Repayments of qualified disaster distributions, birth or adoption distributions, and similar special distributions. These go in Boxes 13a through 14b.³
Regular contributions from your earnings. Those belong in Box 1.¹
Trustee-to-trustee transfers between IRAs of the same type. These are nonreportable. If you moved $200,000 from one traditional IRA custodian to another through a direct transfer, neither institution files a 1099-R and nothing shows up in Box 2. That’s correct, not an error. The new custodian will reflect the balance in Box 5, the year-end fair market value.

Why There’s No Dollar Limit in Box 2

Regular IRA contributions reported in Box 1 are capped. For 2026, the limit is $7,500, or $8,600 if you’re age 50 or older (the extra $1,100 is the catch-up).⁴ Going over that cap triggers a 6% excise tax on the excess for every year it stays in the account.⁵

Box 2 has no cap. You can roll $50,000, $500,000, or more from a 401(k) into an IRA with no excess-contribution issue, because the money was already inside the tax-advantaged system. The IRS treats a rollover as retirement money changing addresses, not as a new contribution. Tax treatment follows the same logic: a properly completed rollover is not a taxable event, because the deferral simply continues.

One boundary worth naming even though it doesn’t affect Box 2 directly: an indirect rollover has to be redeposited within 60 days of the distribution, and there’s a once-per-year limit on IRA-to-IRA indirect rollovers. If you’re consolidating accounts, a trustee-to-trustee transfer avoids both traps entirely.

How the IRS Uses the Number

Box 2 exists mostly for matching. When your old plan issues a Form 1099-R showing a distribution with code G, the IRS looks for a corresponding Box 2 amount on the Form 5498 filed by the receiving IRA custodian.² When those numbers line up, the transfer is confirmed and no tax is owed.

When they don’t line up, or when your own return doesn’t show the distribution as a rollover, the automated matching flags it. The system reads the 1099-R as unreported income and generates a notice proposing tax on the full amount. The Form 5498 you receive is your evidence that the money made it to a qualifying account.

Reporting the Rollover on Your Return

Form 5498 doesn’t arrive until after April 15, so you won’t have it in hand when you file. You don’t need it. The 1099-R from the distributing plan and your own deposit records are enough to report the rollover on Form 1040.

For IRA distributions, enter the total on Line 4a and the taxable amount on Line 4b. If you rolled over the entire distribution, Line 4b is zero. Then check Box 1 on Line 4c to indicate the rollover.⁶ For distributions from employer plans like 401(k)s, use Lines 5a and 5b for the gross distribution and taxable amount, then check Box 1 on Line 5c.

If you rolled over only part of the distribution, enter the full amount on Line 4a or 5a and the portion you kept on Line 4b or 5b. That kept portion is taxable income. If you rolled the money into a qualified employer plan rather than an IRA, or if you finished the rollover in the following calendar year, attach a written statement explaining what happened.⁶

When Form 5498 Arrives

IRA custodians have until May 31 to file Form 5498 with the IRS and send you your copy.¹ The late date exists because IRA contributions for a given tax year can be made up to the April 15 filing deadline, and custodians need the extra weeks to capture those March and April deposits.

Some custodians send a preliminary copy earlier in the year and update it later. Others wait and send a single final form after the April window closes. Either way, don’t wait for it before filing.

If Box 2 Is Wrong

When your Form 5498 arrives, compare Box 2 with your records. A custodian might report a regular contribution as a rollover, enter the wrong dollar amount, or miss a rollover entirely. If something looks off, contact the custodian right away with supporting documentation: bank statements, the original distribution check, and the 1099-R from the sending plan.

If the custodian confirms the error, they file a corrected Form 5498 marked “Corrected” with both you and the IRS. The IRS encourages custodians to verify Form 5498 data before filing precisely to avoid these situations.⁷

If a filing deadline is coming up and you don’t have the corrected form yet, file from your own records and attach a statement if needed. Keep all correspondence with the custodian. The burden of proving that a rollover was properly completed falls on you, and documentation is what protects you if the IRS asks questions later.

1
Internal Revenue Service. Form 5498 – IRA Contribution Information
2
Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Forms 1099-R and 5498 (2025)
3
Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Forms 1099-R and 5498 (2025)
4
Internal Revenue Service. 401(k) Limit Increases to $24,500 for 2026, IRA Limit Increases to $7,500
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Internal Revenue Service. Retirement Topics – IRA Contribution Limits
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Internal Revenue Service. 1040 (2025) Instructions
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Internal Revenue Service. Form 5498 – Errors by IRA Trustees, Issuers and Custodians May Cause Tax Trouble