Antidepressant Taper Schedule
Build a personalized week-by-week reduction plan — with dates, proportional step sizes, and a printable chart to bring to your prescriber.
Antidepressant Taper Schedule
Build a gradual, proportional reduction plan — the “hyperbolic-style” pattern where cuts get smaller as your dose gets lower.
SSRI · Half-life: ~26 hours (active metabolite 62–104h)
Total per day, across all doses you take.
Proportional tapering guidance commonly uses 5–10% of the current dose per step.
Longer holds are gentler. Most antidepressant tapers hold 2–4 weeks per cut.
Est. Duration
78 weeks
Total Steps
38
Low Dose Reached
0.9124 mg
Withdrawal Risk
Moderate
Your dose over time
50mg → 0.9124mg
Daily dose (mg) over time — each step down is one planned cut
From step 20, your dose drops below 6.25mg — smaller than the smallest amount standard Sertraline forms can deliver. A manufactured liquid exists (20mg/mL oral concentrate) — ask your prescriber or pharmacist about switching to it for the small steps. Scored tablets split well, and the 20mg/mL oral concentrate makes small late-taper doses practical.
| Step | Starts | Daily Dose | Cut | % of Start |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Start | Sep 24, 2026 | 50 mg | — | 100% |
| 1 | Oct 8, 2026 | 45 mg | −5 mg | 90% |
| 2 | Oct 22, 2026 | 40.5 mg | −4.5 mg | 81% |
| 3 | Nov 5, 2026 | 36.45 mg | −4.05 mg | 72.9% |
| 4 | Nov 19, 2026 | 32.805 mg | −3.645 mg | 65.6% |
| 5 | Dec 3, 2026 | 29.5245 mg | −3.2805 mg | 59% |
| 6 | Dec 17, 2026 | 26.5721 mg | −2.9525 mg | 53.1% |
| 7Halfway | Dec 31, 2026 | 23.9148 mg | −2.6572 mg | 47.8% |
| 8 | Jan 14, 2027 | 21.5234 mg | −2.3915 mg | 43% |
| 9 | Jan 28, 2027 | 19.371 mg | −2.1523 mg | 38.7% |
| 10 | Feb 11, 2027 | 17.4339 mg | −1.9371 mg | 34.9% |
| 11 | Feb 25, 2027 | 15.6905 mg | −1.7434 mg | 31.4% |
| 12 | Mar 11, 2027 | 14.1215 mg | −1.5691 mg | 28.2% |
| 13 | Mar 25, 2027 | 12.7093 mg | −1.4121 mg | 25.4% |
| 1475% done | Apr 8, 2027 | 11.4384 mg | −1.2709 mg | 22.9% |
| 15 | Apr 22, 2027 | 10.2946 mg | −1.1438 mg | 20.6% |
| 16 | May 6, 2027 | 9.2651 mg | −1.0295 mg | 18.5% |
| 17 | May 20, 2027 | 8.3386 mg | −0.9265 mg | 16.7% |
| 18 | Jun 3, 2027 | 7.5047 mg | −0.8339 mg | 15% |
| 19 | Jun 17, 2027 | 6.7543 mg | −0.7505 mg | 13.5% |
| 20 | Jul 1, 2027 | 6.0788 mg* | −0.6754 mg | 12.2% |
| 21 | Jul 15, 2027 | 5.4709 mg* | −0.6079 mg | 10.9% |
| 22 | Jul 29, 2027 | 4.9239 mg* | −0.5471 mg | 9.8% |
| 23 | Aug 12, 2027 | 4.4315 mg* | −0.4924 mg | 8.9% |
| 24 | Aug 26, 2027 | 3.9883 mg* | −0.4431 mg | 8% |
| 25 | Sep 9, 2027 | 3.5895 mg* | −0.3988 mg | 7.2% |
| 26 | Sep 23, 2027 | 3.2305 mg* | −0.3589 mg | 6.5% |
| 27 | Oct 7, 2027 | 2.9075 mg* | −0.3231 mg | 5.8% |
| 28 | Oct 21, 2027 | 2.6167 mg* | −0.2907 mg | 5.2% |
| 29 | Nov 4, 2027 | 2.3551 mg* | −0.2617 mg | 4.7% |
| 30 | Nov 18, 2027 | 2.1196 mg* | −0.2355 mg | 4.2% |
| 31 | Dec 2, 2027 | 1.9076 mg* | −0.212 mg | 3.8% |
| 32 | Dec 16, 2027 | 1.7168 mg* | −0.1908 mg | 3.4% |
| 33 | Dec 30, 2027 | 1.5452 mg* | −0.1717 mg | 3.1% |
| 34 | Jan 13, 2028 | 1.3906 mg* | −0.1545 mg | 2.8% |
| 35 | Jan 27, 2028 | 1.2516 mg* | −0.1391 mg | 2.5% |
| 36 | Feb 10, 2028 | 1.1264 mg* | −0.1252 mg | 2.3% |
| 37 | Feb 24, 2028 | 1.0138 mg* | −0.1126 mg | 2% |
| 38 | Mar 9, 2028 | 0.9124 mg* | −0.1014 mg | 1.8% |
* Dose likely requires a liquid formulation or compounding pharmacy. The schedule stops around 0.9124mg — the final “jump-off” to zero should be decided together with your prescriber. Many people slow down (smaller cuts, longer holds) in this last stretch.
Email me my schedule — and get a reminder when your next cut is due
We'll email you this exact schedule, unlock the clean doctor-ready printable, and send one short reminder on each cut day with your new dose. No newsletters, no noise — unsubscribe anytime.
Know someone else who's tapering?
Your link carries this exact schedule — they can view it, adjust it, and build their own.
Safety Warning: This tool performs mathematics only. It does not account for your medical history, how long you've taken the medication, or your stability at each step. Tapering schedules should always be slowed down if withdrawal symptoms become severe, and depression or anxiety returning during a taper is a reason to pause and talk to your prescriber. Never change your dose or stop an antidepressant abruptly without medical guidance.
Tapering a specific medication?
Each page below is pre-configured with drug-specific guidance — half-life, available strengths, and what to do when the doses get too small for tablets.
How this taper schedule builder works
The builder follows the proportional (“hyperbolic-style”) approach described by Horowitz & Taylor (Lancet Psychiatry, 2019) and the Maudsley Deprescribing Guidelines: reduce by a percentage of your current dose, hold long enough to stabilize (usually 2–4 weeks), then repeat. Because each cut is proportional, the reductions shrink in milligrams as you descend — which is what keeps each step's impact on your nervous system roughly constant.
The schedule also shows each dose as a percentage of your starting dose, so you and your prescriber can see the true shape of the taper, and it flags the step where reductions become too small to achieve with your medication's standard forms.
Why fixed-dose drops go wrong at the bottom
A schedule like 20mg → 15mg → 10mg → 5mg → 0 looks even. It isn't. Because serotonin transporter occupancy climbs steeply at low doses and flattens at higher ones, that final 5mg → 0 step removes far more of the drug's actual effect than the first 20mg → 15mg step did.
This is the single most common reason a taper that started smoothly falls apart at the end — and it's why the last few milligrams need the smallest steps and the longest holds, not a sprint to the finish.
The last stretch: getting to zero
Every proportional taper eventually reaches doses that standard tablets can't measure. That's not a dead end — it's a planned phase. Where a manufactured oral liquid exists (sertraline, escitalopram, citalopram, fluoxetine, paroxetine), it's usually the simplest route. Where it doesn't — Effexor XR and Cymbalta being the notable cases — the options are switching to a splittable form, counting capsule beads with prescriber supervision, or compounded doses.
The builder marks where this phase begins for your medication so you can arrange it in advance rather than discovering it at the pharmacy counter.
Frequently asked questions
How do I calculate an antidepressant taper?
The approach described in modern deprescribing guidance is to reduce by a percentage of your current dose — commonly 5-10% — and hold for two to four weeks before the next step. Because each cut is a percentage of the current (not the original) dose, the reductions get smaller in milligrams as you descend. Enter your medication, daily dose, cut percentage, and hold time above and the builder produces the full schedule with dates.
What is hyperbolic tapering?
Hyperbolic tapering means reducing the dose in steps that produce an even change in the drug's effect rather than an even change in milligrams. Serotonin transporter occupancy rises steeply at low doses and flattens at higher ones, so a fixed 10mg cut removes far more effect at the bottom of the range than at the top. Proportional reductions — taking a percentage of the current dose each time — approximate that curve, which is why the final steps end up very small.
How long does it take to taper off an antidepressant?
Longer than most people expect. Reaching a very low final dose with 10% steps takes roughly 38 reductions, so a two-week hold works out to around 18 months and a four-week hold to about three years. Those numbers surprise people, and they are why many prescribers use larger steps early and small steps only at the low end. What matters more than the total is that each individual step is small enough to be uneventful — speed should always yield to symptoms, and holding longer at a dose is a normal part of a successful taper rather than a failure.
Which antidepressants does this cover?
SSRIs (sertraline/Zoloft, escitalopram/Lexapro, citalopram/Celexa, fluoxetine/Prozac, paroxetine/Paxil), SNRIs (venlafaxine/Effexor XR, duloxetine/Cymbalta), and atypicals (bupropion/Wellbutrin XL, mirtazapine/Remeron). Each carries its own half-life, available strengths, and formulation notes, and there are dedicated pages with drug-specific guidance for Zoloft, Lexapro, Effexor, and Cymbalta.
What if the cuts get too small for my tablets?
Every proportional taper eventually reaches doses below what tablet-splitting can deliver, and the schedule marks exactly where that happens for your medication. From there the options are a manufactured oral liquid where one exists (sertraline, escitalopram, citalopram, fluoxetine, paroxetine all have one in the US), compounded doses, or — for capsules like Effexor XR and Cymbalta — switching forms or counting beads under prescriber supervision. This last stretch is normal and plannable.
Can I taper off an antidepressant without a doctor?
You shouldn't do it alone. A prescriber keeps your supply stable, can write for liquid formulations or smaller strengths, and — importantly — can help you tell withdrawal apart from a returning depressive or anxiety episode, which is genuinely hard to judge from the inside. If your prescriber is reluctant to go slowly, a printed schedule is a useful starting point for that conversation.
Is it withdrawal or relapse?
The distinction matters and it deserves your prescriber's input rather than a self-diagnosis. As a rough guide: discontinuation symptoms tend to appear within days of a dose change and often include physical features — dizziness, 'brain zaps', nausea, flu-like feelings — that a returning episode usually doesn't, and they typically settle if you hold at a stable dose. Relapse tends to build more gradually over weeks and resembles how your original episode felt. Holding rather than continuing down is a reasonable way to get more information.
Sources
- Horowitz, M.A. & Taylor, D. (2019). Tapering of SSRI treatment to mitigate withdrawal symptoms, Lancet Psychiatry — the basis of hyperbolic tapering.
- Horowitz, M.A. & Taylor, D. (2024). The Maudsley Deprescribing Guidelines — practical proportional-taper schedules for antidepressants.
- US FDA prescribing information for each medication — half-life values, available strengths, and formulation details.