Per stirpes and per capita are two ways of telling your will, trust, or beneficiary form how to split assets among descendants when one of them dies before you do. Per stirpes keeps each child’s branch of the family intact, so a deceased child’s share passes down to their own children. Per capita ignores branches and divides the money equally among every living person in the named group. Choose the wrong one for your family and a single grandchild can inherit three times what their cousin receives, or a surviving child can end up with the same share as a grandchild.
The two methods only diverge when a beneficiary dies before you. If all your children outlive you, the labels do not matter — each child gets an equal share either way. The stakes appear the moment a child predeceases you and leaves descendants of their own.
How Per Stirpes Works
Per stirpes means “by the roots.” The estate is divided into equal shares at the first generation below you, one share per child, and if a child has died, that child’s share flows down to their descendants. The split always starts at the children’s level, whether or not any children are actually alive.
Take a $900,000 estate and three children. Each child’s branch is allocated $300,000. If your first child has died leaving two grandchildren, those two grandchildren split that $300,000 and receive $150,000 each. Your two surviving children still get $300,000 apiece.
The outcomes get uneven across grandchildren fast. If your second child has also died but left only one grandchild, that lone grandchild inherits the full $300,000 from that branch. Meanwhile the first child’s two grandchildren are still splitting their $300,000 at $150,000 each. Same generation, very different checks. Per stirpes treats branches as equal, not individuals.
This remains the most common designation in traditional wills because it is predictable and because many people think of their estate as belonging to each child’s family as a unit. The death of one child never changes what the other children receive.
How Per Capita Works
Per capita means “by the head.” It divides the estate equally among every living person in the designated class, ignoring which branch they come from and often ignoring generation as well. A gift “to my descendants, per capita” is split by a simple head count of descendants alive at your death.
Same $900,000 estate, same three children. Assume the first child (two grandchildren) and the second child (one grandchild) have both died, and the third child is alive with no children of their own. Four grandchildren and one surviving child are living — five people. Each receives $180,000. The surviving child gets exactly what each grandchild gets.
Pure equality is the point. Nobody in the eligible group inherits more than anyone else. The trade-off is that per capita flattens generational hierarchy: a child inherits the same amount as a grandchild, which many testators do not actually intend. Shares also shift unpredictably based on who happens to be alive at the moment of death.
Per Capita at Each Generation
A third option, per capita at each generation, splits the difference and has become the default in states that follow the Uniform Probate Code. It starts like per stirpes by creating shares at the first generation with living members. Living members take their share. Then the shares that would have gone to deceased members at that level are pooled together and divided equally among all surviving descendants at the next generation down.
Back to the $900,000 estate. Three children: first and second deceased (three and one grandchildren respectively), third alive. Three shares of $300,000 are created at the children’s level. The surviving third child takes one share, $300,000. The other two shares, $600,000 total, are pooled and divided equally among all four grandchildren across both deceased branches. Each grandchild gets $150,000.
Compare that to per stirpes, where the second child’s only grandchild would have taken a full $300,000 while the first child’s three grandchildren split $300,000 three ways. The hybrid preserves the idea that children sit above grandchildren in the hierarchy, while making sure cousins in the same generation receive the same amount.
Same Family, Three Different Outcomes
The sharpest way to see the choice is to run one family through all three methods. A $900,000 estate, three children. Child A has died leaving three grandchildren. Child B has died leaving one grandchild. Child C is alive with no children.
- Per stirpes: Child C receives $300,000. The three grandchildren from Child A’s branch split $300,000 and receive $100,000 each. The lone grandchild from Child B’s branch receives the full $300,000. One grandchild inherits three times as much as each of the others.
- Per capita across all descendants: Five living people split equally. Child C and each of the four grandchildren receive $180,000. The surviving child is treated identically to a grandchild.
- Per capita at each generation: Child C receives a full $300,000. The remaining $600,000 is pooled and split four ways among the grandchildren at $150,000 each. The surviving child’s generational position is preserved, and the grandchildren are treated equally.
The language in your document, nothing more, is what decides which of those outcomes your family lives with. On a larger estate the swing scales up proportionally, so the gap between the best-off and worst-off grandchild grows into hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Who Counts as a Descendant
All three methods pass shares to “descendants” or “issue,” so the definition of that class matters. Biological children and legally adopted children are lineal descendants in every state. Stepchildren are not.
If your daughter marries someone with a child from a prior relationship and your daughter later dies before you, a per stirpes gift to her descendants passes to her biological or adopted children only. The stepchild is excluded unless your daughter legally adopted them.
Adopted children receive full inheritance rights in virtually every state, with one wrinkle for class gifts from third parties: an adult adoptee may not qualify for a gift to a class like “my grandchildren” unless the adoption occurred before age eighteen, or the adoptive parent was a stepparent or foster parent, or the adoptive parent functioned as a parent before the adoptee turned eighteen.
If you want a stepchild or an adult adoptee to inherit, name them. Do not rely on “my descendants, per stirpes” to pick them up, because it will not.
Retirement Accounts and Life Insurance Are Separate
Retirement accounts, life insurance policies, and payable-on-death bank accounts pass outside your will. The beneficiary form on file at the institution controls, and your will cannot override it.
Some IRA and 401(k) custodians allow you to write “per stirpes” after a beneficiary’s name so that the deceased beneficiary’s share flows to their descendants instead of being swept up by the surviving co-beneficiaries. Many institutions do not accept the language. The federal government’s life insurance program for employees explicitly rejects per stirpes designations and tells account holders to name specific contingent beneficiaries or route the proceeds through their estate instead.1U.S. Office of Personnel Management. What Is a Per Stirpes Designation – Can I Use One When Designating Beneficiaries for My FEGLI Life Insurance
When a form says nothing about representation and a named beneficiary dies before you, defaults vary. Some plans redistribute the deceased person’s share among the surviving beneficiaries, cutting out the deceased beneficiary’s children entirely. Others fall back to a plan hierarchy that may send the money to your spouse or your estate. Either outcome can flatly contradict what your will says. Confirm whether your custodian accepts per stirpes language. If it does not, name contingent beneficiaries explicitly for each primary beneficiary.
What Happens If Your Document Is Silent
Every state has an anti-lapse statute that steps in when a will leaves a gift to someone who dies before the testator and the will says nothing about what should happen next. These statutes typically substitute the deceased beneficiary’s descendants in their place, but only when the beneficiary had a qualifying family relationship with the testator. Some states limit the protection to descendants and siblings; others extend it to any blood or adopted relative. Gifts to friends or neighbors are not covered.
Anti-lapse rules are defaults. If your will already says “to my daughter, per stirpes,” the per stirpes language controls and the statute does not apply. If the will simply says “to my daughter” and she dies first, the statute decides whether her children take her share. The lesson is to write the distribution rule into every bequest rather than leave it to a default you have not read.
If no will exists at all, state intestacy law chooses the method for you. States that have adopted the Uniform Probate Code generally default to per capita at each generation. Other states default to traditional per stirpes. A handful use something in between. The only reliable way to control the result is to say so in a will or trust and align every beneficiary form on your financial accounts with that same plan.
A Note on Generation-Skipping Transfer Tax
When assets pass by representation to grandchildren or more remote descendants, the federal generation-skipping transfer tax can apply in addition to any estate tax. It is a flat 40% on amounts above the exemption.2Congress.gov. The Generation-Skipping Transfer Tax (GSTT)
For 2026, the GST exemption is $15 million per person following the One Big Beautiful Bill Act signed into law in July 2025.3Internal Revenue Service. Whats New – Estate and Gift Tax Married couples can combine exemptions up to $30 million. Estates below those thresholds do not owe GST tax no matter how many generations the assets skip.
A key exception, the predeceased parent rule, treats a grandchild as sitting in the child’s generation for GST purposes if the grandchild’s parent (your child) has already died at the time of the transfer. The transfer is not a generation-skipping transfer at all, and no GST tax applies. The rule exists because per stirpes and per capita at each generation routinely send assets to grandchildren after a child’s death, and taxing those transfers would penalize families for a death they did not choose. The exception covers lineal descendants only; it does not reach collateral relatives like grandnieces or grandnephews when the transferor still has living lineal descendants.4Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 2651 – Generation Assignment
Pick the representation method that matches how you actually want the money distributed, put it in writing, and check that every beneficiary form says the same thing. The Latin phrase in your will is doing more work than almost any other language in the document.