Calculators LIC plans Jeevan Labh Review
LIC Jeevan Labh (Plan 736) is a limited-pay endowment policy with terms of 16, 21, or 25 years and premium-paying terms of 10, 15, or 16 years. As of 2026, its declared simple reversionary bonus is approximately ₹47 per ₹1,000 sum assured per year, plus a final additional bonus of ₹200 per ₹1,000 SA at maturity. The implicit XIRR for a 30-year-old buying ₹5 lakh sum assured for 21 years (15-year PPT) works out to roughly 7.2% — modestly above a fixed deposit, with the upside that maturity proceeds are tax-free under §10(10D) and premiums qualify for §80C. Bonus rates are not guaranteed for the future, so the actual yield can be lower.
A 28–35 year old salaried earner whose §80C bucket isn't already saturated by EPF + home-loan principal, who genuinely cannot maintain a separate SIP discipline, and who has at least a 16-year horizon before needing the lump sum. The shorter PPT (10 yrs) is attractive only if your income peaks early and you want the policy fully paid before kids' fees start.
Anyone whose primary need is life cover (buy term instead — ₹1 cr cover is roughly the same premium as ₹5 L of Jeevan Labh). Anyone with a 15+ year horizon who has the discipline to SIP into an index fund instead — even after tax, equities have historically beaten endowment XIRR by 3–6 percentage points. Anyone who might need to exit before year 8 — surrender penalties are brutal.
LIC could declare lower bonus rates in future years (the rate isn't guaranteed). You could lapse the policy in years 1–2 and lose 100% of premiums. You could surrender mid-term and recover 30–60% of premiums depending on year. None of these scenarios are hypothetical — they're the modal outcomes for buyers who weren't suited to the product in the first place.
Most review sites either understate the XIRR (by lumping in rider premiums in the denominator) or overstate it (by picking the shortest PPT, which inflates the headline). Our 7.2% figure assumes the middle PPT (15 yrs against a 21-yr term) and excludes rider premiums from the XIRR base — riders buy protection, not yield, so mixing them deflates the return artificially.
Our headline XIRR uses the middle premium-paying term (15 years against a 21-year policy term), excludes optional rider premiums from the cash-flow base, and assumes the latest declared simple reversionary bonus rate holds for the full term. Try other PPTs and bonus assumptions on the Jeevan Labh calculator.
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