Orbiter Income 10-Year review

Yes, for the right buyer. This is a good annuity for someone who wants protected lifetime income, values principal protection along the way, and is genuinely planning several years ahead before turning income on. It is less appealing for someone who wants short-term liquidity, the strongest possible accumulation terms, or the simplest annuity they can find. The whole design only pays off if you actually use the income rider you are paying for.

The main reason to buy Orbiter Income is to build future protected lifetime income while keeping principal protected from market losses along the way. The 10% simple roll-up means the benefit base your future income is calculated from grows in a predictable way during the deferral years, regardless of how the indices perform. For a buyer who wants to know roughly what their income will look like in ten years and doesn't want to gamble on market returns to get there, that predictability is the appeal.

I think this annuity is best for someone in the pre-retirement or early-retirement window, roughly late 50s through mid-70s, who wants to use long-term money to create future income and expects to defer withdrawals for several years before activating the rider. It fits a buyer who values a built-in income guarantee over relying on annuitization later, and who has other liquid assets to cover near-term needs. It is less attractive for someone who mainly wants growth, expects to need frequent access to principal above the free amount, or is buying inside the issue-age band but unlikely to wait long enough to let the roll-up do its work.

You are not really buying stock market upside here. You are buying a lifetime income framework wrapped around a principal-protected annuity. The heart of the contract is the Equilibrium Plus rider. Your premium establishes a benefit base, that benefit base grows at 10% simple interest each year for the first ten years (or until you start income), and your age when you turn income on helps set the guaranteed withdrawal percentage you can take for life. The index-crediting side exists mostly to support that income guarantee, not to chase the highest possible accumulation.

The Equilibrium Plus Guaranteed Lifetime Withdrawal Benefit is built into the contract, so there is no decision to add it. Before you turn income on, the rider applies a 10% simple-interest credit each contract year to the benefit base for the first ten years, or until you start taking income, whichever comes first. Simple interest matters here: it means each year's credit is calculated on the original premium rather than compounding on a growing balance, so a $100,000 premium adds $10,000 to the benefit base each year for ten years rather than snowballing. After that first ten-year window, or in any year you take a withdrawal, the rider switches to a minimum 1% simple credit. When you activate income, your guaranteed annual withdrawal is a percentage of that benefit base, set by your age. The benefit base is a calculation figure for income only. It is not money you can walk away with as cash.

The most meaningful secondary feature is the index-crediting menu. Orbiter Income offers annual point-to-point participation-rate strategies on a group of specialty indices (Barclay's Global Trailblazer, US Balanced Asset 10, US Daily Risk Managed 12, US Multi-Asset Diversified 5, US Multi-Asset Risk Managed 5, and US Strategic Balanced Asset 8), an annual point-to-point cap strategy on the S&P 500, and a fixed account currently crediting 3.00%. The participation-rate indices carry no cap, with participation rates ranging from 62% to 154% depending on the index as of the December 15, 2025 rate sheet, while the S&P 500 cap ran 4.55% to 6.05% over the same period. Those rates are a snapshot and will change. The credited interest here can lift your actual contract value above what the income guarantee alone provides, which can support a larger death benefit or, in good years, give you more cash value if you ever decide to surrender or take excess withdrawals.

This annuity is built for long-term retirement dollars, not short-term cash. There is no free withdrawal at all in year one. Starting in year two, you can take up to 10% of contract value per year without a surrender charge. Anything above that during the surrender period is hit with a withdrawal charge that runs 9% in years one and two, then steps down 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 before reaching zero after year ten. A market value adjustment also applies to surrenders and excess withdrawals, meaning the penalty can move with interest rates: if rates have risen since you bought the contract, the MVA can increase what you give up. Some relief exists. A Nursing Home Waiver can waive surrender charges if you're confined to a qualifying facility, and surrender charges are waived at death. The brochure does not specifically address whether required minimum distributions are exempt from surrender charges, so if this is qualified money, confirm the RMD treatment with AuguStar before you buy.

The headline fee is the rider: 1.15% annually, charged on the benefit base, for the Equilibrium Plus lifetime withdrawal benefit. Because it's charged on the benefit base rather than the contract value, and because the benefit base is growing at 10% simple interest during the deferral years, this fee tends to grow over time and can reach a contractual maximum of 2.50%. That fee is deducted from your contract value whether or not you have turned income on, so the rider only earns its keep if you actually use it. There is no separate base-contract fee disclosed in the materials. Beyond the explicit fee, the real tradeoffs are structural: the participation rates and caps on the crediting menu are set to support the income guarantee, so the growth side is generally more muted than a pure accumulation FIA, and the MVA means larger withdrawals can be affected by more than just the surrender charge. The trade you're making is clear enough: you pay 1.15% a year and lock up the money for a decade to buy a known, growing income base. Whether that's worth it comes down to whether you actually turn income on and live long enough for the lifetime guarantee to outrun the fees.

Legal Entity: AuguStar Life Insurance Company

Parent: Constellation Insurance

AM Best Rating: A