14th August 2026 - 7 min read
Every year at tax time, SSPN and PRS show up on the relief list. Both are types of savings that also cut your tax bill. SSPN is an education savings account run by the National Higher Education Fund Corporation (PTPTN). PRS, short for Private Retirement Scheme, is a retirement fund you pay into on top of your EPF.
The two get compared because both reward you for saving. They are separate reliefs with separate limits, so if you qualify for both, you can claim both in the same year.
PTPTN has run SSPN since 2004 as a savings account for a child’s higher education. You open the account and name your child as the beneficiary. Deposits start from RM20.
There are two versions of SSPN. Simpan SSPN Prime is the plain savings account, and if your balance reaches RM1,000 it comes with free takaful protection that PTPTN pays for.
Simpan SSPN Plus offers wider takaful coverage, but you pay a fixed monthly contribution for it. The takaful portion of Plus contributions can also be claimed under the separate life insurance and takaful relief, if you have room left under that relief.
In these accounts, your money earns a dividend that PTPTN declares each year. For 2025 the rate was 4.10%, the highest in 11 years. In 2024 it was 4.05%. Savings are guaranteed by the government, so your balance does not fall. The scheme is also Shariah-compliant.
Families with a monthly household income of RM4,000 or below can claim a matching grant of up to RM10,000 once the child enrols in higher education.
The tax relief is up to RM8,000 a year on your net savings, which is what you put in minus what you take out over the year.
PRS is a voluntary retirement fund approved by the Securities Commission and administered by the Private Pension Administrator (PPA). You choose a provider and a fund, then pay in at your own pace. Contributions usually start from RM100, and there is a one-off RM10 fee to open your PPA account.
Providers offer funds ranging from conservative to growth, and the more aggressive the fund, the more its value moves around. Returns are not guaranteed, and the value of your savings can drop.
Anyone aged 18 and above can join, Malaysian or not, employed or self-employed.
The tax relief is up to RM3,000 a year. That limit is shared with deferred annuity premiums, so if you pay into both, RM3,000 is the combined cap.
SSPN and PRS sit on separate lines of your tax form with separate limits.
The PRS relief is also separate from the RM4,000 EPF and approved scheme relief. Maxing your EPF relief does not stop you claiming PRS.
Neither relief is permanent. The SSPN relief is set to run until the 2027 tax year and the PRS relief until 2030, though the government can extend either at a future budget as it did in Budget 2025. Neither changed in Budget 2026.
Tax relief lowers the income LHDN taxes you on, not your tax bill directly. Claim RM8,000 of SSPN relief and LHDN treats you as if you earned RM8,000 less. Your savings is the tax you would have paid on that RM8,000, which depends on your tax band.
This is what a full claim on each is worth.
| Chargeable Income Before Relief | SSPN RM8,000 Saves You | PRS RM3,000 Saves You |
| RM45,000 | RM480 | RM180 |
| RM60,000 | RM880 | RM330 |
| RM85,000 | RM1,520 | RM570 |
| RM120,000 | RM2,000 | RM750 |
Chargeable income is what is left of your income after EPF and all your other reliefs. Reliefs at higher income levels are worth more, because the tax they knock off is charged at a higher rate. And if your reliefs bring your chargeable income down to RM35,000 or below, you also qualify for a RM400 tax rebate, so the savings can be bigger than the table shows.
For SSPN, the relief goes to biological parents, adoptive parents or legal guardians who save into an account for their child. Any child from newborn to below 29 years old qualifies.
You can open an SSPN account with yourself as the beneficiary, but PTPTN says plainly that you cannot claim tax relief on it. And with no child to name, there is no SSPN relief for you to claim.
The RM8,000 is a cap per taxpayer, not per child. If you and your spouse file separately, only one of you claims it, and it should be whoever sits in the higher tax band. That rule is new from YA2025. Before that, parents filing separately could each claim RM8,000. Claiming the full RM8,000 saves RM1,120 more in the 25% band than in the 11% band.
If you file jointly, you claim it together on the one return. Divorced parents are the exception. Each can claim up to RM8,000 on their own return, and PTPTN notes that LHDN matches ex-spouses’ records when checking claims.
PRS is open to anyone aged 18 and above, whether or not you have children. The relief only helps tax residents, though. Non-residents are taxed at a flat rate with no reliefs, so a non-resident who joins PRS gets nothing back at tax time.
Simpan SSPN Prime lets you take your money out anytime. The daily online limit is RM1,000 per account, and anything larger goes through a PTPTN counter. Plus on the other hand only allows you to withdraw after three years, and you have to keep at least RM1,000 in the account.
Your relief is based on your net savings for the year. Put in RM8,000 and take out RM1,000 in the same year, and you can only claim RM7,000.
There is one exception, from YA2025 onwards. If you take money out to pay your child’s college or university fees, that withdrawal does not reduce your claim. Any other withdrawal still does.
PRS is much tighter. Your contributions split automatically, with 70% going into sub-account A and 30% going into sub-account B. Sub-account A is locked until you turn 55. From sub-account B, you can make one withdrawal a year with each provider, and only once you have been a member for at least a year. Whatever you take out, 8% is deducted as a tax penalty.
Taking money out for housing or healthcare is exempted from penalty, and so is a full withdrawal when you leave Malaysia for good, on death, or on serious disability. The lock is really just until retirement. At 55 you can withdraw everything from both sub-accounts, penalty-free.
If you have a child under 29 and you are saving for their education, start with SSPN. The relief is bigger, the return is guaranteed, and you can still get the money if something goes wrong. Without a child, PRS is the only one you can claim.
If you have a child and only a few thousand ringgit spare, think about when you need the money back. SSPN money is reachable next month. PRS money is locked until retirement unless you pay the 8% penalty fee. For anyone in their twenties or thirties, that is a long commitment in exchange for a tax saving of RM330 to RM750 a year.
The tax saving works best as a bonus on money you were going to save anyway, not as the reason to save in the first place. Putting RM8,000 into SSPN to get RM880 back only makes sense if you wanted that money in SSPN anyway.
You do not send any documents in when you file. You key the relief amounts into your e-Filing form yourself, then keep the paperwork in case LHDN asks to see it later.
For SSPN, download your statement from the myPTPTN app, which shows a tax relief statement alongside your savings. Deposits have to reach PTPTN by 31 December to count for that year, and for anything paid outside a PTPTN counter, PTPTN suggests paying in by 25 December to give it time to process. For PRS, your provider issues a contribution statement. Your contributions also need to reach the provider by 31 December to count for that year.
Keep both statements for seven years, which is how far back LHDN can go if it decides to check your claim.
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Pugaleshwaran Raja Kumaran is a Tax Executive Director at ThinkTX Consultants, with over a decade of experience delivering strategic and practical tax solutions. He advises high-net-worth individuals, multinational corporations, and growing businesses, helping them manage complex tax matters with clarity and confidence.
He has extensive experience across a broad range of tax engagements, including corporate tax compliance, Capital Gains Tax (CGT), withholding tax, stamp duty, Real Property Gains Tax (RPGT), Sales and Service Tax (SST), and advisory on inbound and outbound investments. He also leads practice areas covering tax incentives, tax audits and investigations, private client advisory, tax due diligence, and e-Invoicing advisory, providing comprehensive support across the business life cycle.
Beyond client advisory, Pugaleshwaran actively contributes to the tax profession through writing and speaking on Malaysian tax policy, regulatory developments, and industry best practices. His work has been published by the International Bureau of Fiscal Documentation (IBFD) and Wolters Kluwer (CCH), including contributions to Malaysia’s Sales and Service Tax (SST) content updates.
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