Alimony After Florida's 2023 Reform

What changed, in one paragraph

Senate Bill 1416, effective July 1, 2023, rewrote Fla. Stat. § 61.08. For cases filed on or after that date, courts can no longer award permanent alimony. Support now comes in four forms — temporary, bridge-the-gap, rehabilitative, and durational — each with defined limits, and durational alimony carries hard caps on both length and amount. Awards entered under the old law weren't erased, but the new statute shapes how they're modified, particularly around a payor's retirement.

The two questions that come before "which type"

Nothing about alimony starts with types. A court first asks whether the requesting spouse has an actual need for support, and whether the other spouse has the ability to pay. Only if both are proven does the conversation reach form, amount, and duration — weighed against factors like the length of the marriage, each spouse's earning capacity, resources, age and health, and contributions to the marriage, including years spent raising children.

The four types, practically speaking

• Temporary — support during the case itself, ending at final judgment. Often the most urgent issue for a spouse without income access in month one.
• Bridge-the-gap — short-run transition money for identifiable needs: a rental deposit, months until the house sells. Maximum two years; once set, neither the amount nor the length can be modified.
• Rehabilitative — funding for a specific, written plan to rebuild earning power: a license renewed, a degree finished, retraining completed. Capped at five years, and the plan's concreteness is what wins it.
• Durational — a set support period after divorce, available only for marriages of three years or more. Length is capped at 50% of a marriage under 10 years, 60% of a 10–20 year marriage, and 75% of a 20-plus year marriage. Amount is capped at the recipient's reasonable need or 35% of the difference between the spouses' net incomes — whichever is less.

What this means depending on where you sit

If you may receive support: the reform rewards preparation. Need has to be documented — a real budget, a clear picture of earning capacity, and for rehabilitative claims, a plan specific enough for a judge to fund. Vague hardship loses to arithmetic under the new statute; documented need does not.

If you may pay support: the caps are genuine protections, but they operate on net income — so the calculation of both incomes, from bonuses to business earnings, is where your case is actually decided. The statute also addresses retirement expressly, giving payors a structured path to modification that the old law handled inconsistently.

Either way: alimony doesn't stand alone. It's negotiated alongside property division and child support as one financial settlement, and trade-offs across the three are where good outcomes get built.

Common misreadings worth correcting

"No more permanent alimony" does not mean no more alimony — long marriages can still produce durational awards running many years. "The 35% cap" applies to durational alimony, not to every support conversation. And existing permanent awards did not vanish in 2023 — they continue until modified or terminated under the statute's rules. If you're living under an older award, on either side of it, the interaction between old judgment and new law is exactly the kind of question to bring to a consultation. The full legal treatment is on the alimony practice page.

Key law: Fla. Stat. § 61.08 (as amended by ch. 2023-315, SB 1416); § 61.14 (modification).