Advisory Retirement Income Annuity review

Yes, for the right buyer. This is a good annuity for someone already working with a fee-only advisor who wants tax-deferred, market-based growth at a very low contract cost and full liquidity. It is less appealing for someone shopping on their own, since this product is not sold direct, and for anyone who wants principal protection rather than market exposure, because a variable annuity puts your money in subaccounts that can lose value.

The main reason to buy NARIA is to get a low-cost, tax-deferred wrapper around a broad menu of investments inside an advisory relationship. The secondary reason is optionality: you can hold it purely for accumulation and later activate a lifetime income rider if your retirement plan calls for it. Because the contract has no surrender charges, the usual variable-annuity objection — being locked in — largely goes away. And because advisory fees can be deducted from the contract without reducing the living benefit or death benefit base, the annuity slots into a fee-based plan without the rider math getting penalized.

I think NARIA is best for an investor in or near retirement who already pays an advisor a flat advisory fee, wants tax-deferred growth beyond what their IRA or 401(k) allows, and values keeping full access to their money. It fits both qualified and non-qualified money, though the tax-deferral benefit matters most for after-tax (non-qualified) dollars since qualified accounts are already tax-deferred. It is not a fit for someone without an advisor relationship, someone who wants guaranteed principal, or someone who wants the simplest possible guaranteed-income contract — a fixed or income annuity does that job more directly.

You are not buying a guarantee. You are buying a tax-deferred investment account, wrapped in an insurance contract, with the option to add guarantees later. Your money goes into variable subaccounts — essentially mutual-fund-like portfolios — and the account value rises and falls with those investments. The insurance wrapper does two things: it defers taxes on growth until withdrawal, and it gives you access to optional living-benefit and death-benefit riders you cannot get in a plain brokerage account. The "advisory" label means this is an I-share class designed for fee-based advisors, so there is no built-in commission and the base contract cost is stripped down to 0.20%.

The core of the contract is the subaccount platform. NARIA offers roughly 156 variable subaccounts with net expense ratios ranging from 0.11% to 2.58%, so the actual cost of your investments depends heavily on which funds you choose. There are no indexed or fixed crediting strategies here — this is pure market participation, unlike a fixed indexed annuity. On top of the fund expenses, the base contract charge is 0.20% (a 0.15% mortality and expense charge plus a 0.05% administrative charge), and there is no annual maintenance or contract fee. A low-cost fund platform fee of 0.10% to 0.35% applies if you invest in the low-cost fund lineup. Standard dollar cost averaging is available for phasing money in over time. (These figures are dated 4/24/2026 in the materials and can change.)

The optional lifetime income riders are what turn this from an investment account into a retirement-income tool, and they are worth understanding because the pricing varies widely. Three riders are available: the Lifetime Income Rider+ Core Advisory (1.30% single / 1.60% joint), the Lifetime Income Rider+ Accelerated Advisory (same 1.30% / 1.60%), and the lower-cost Nationwide Pro 4 Income Rider (0.45% single / 0.60% joint). None is built in — you choose whether to add one and pay for it. The big structural advantage is that advisory fees of up to 1.50% of average contract value can be withdrawn each year without reducing the income or death benefit base, which means the advisor's fee does not quietly erode the guarantee you are paying the rider for. The roll-up rate on the benefit base was not detailed in the available materials, so if income is your goal, get the current rider specifications before deciding.

Liquidity is this product's standout trait. There are no surrender charges and no market value adjustment, so you can withdraw any amount at any time for any reason. That is genuinely unusual for a variable annuity and removes the "trapped money" concern most people have about these contracts. The catch is the tax code, not the contract: withdrawals of earnings are taxed as ordinary income, and any withdrawal before age 59½ may trigger a 10% federal tax penalty. So the money is liquid from the insurer's standpoint but still carries the normal tax-deferred-account strings. There is no minimum guaranteed surrender value (MGSV) because this is a variable contract — your account value is whatever the subaccounts are worth.

The fee story has two layers. The base contract is cheap — 0.20%, with no maintenance or annual contract fee — which is the main reason this product is competitive. But the subaccounts carry their own expenses, from a low of 0.11% up to 2.58%, so a poorly chosen fund lineup can cost more than the insurance wrapper itself. Then, if you want guaranteed income, the rider stacks on top: 0.45% to 0.60% for the Pro 4 rider, or 1.30% to 1.60% for the Core and Accelerated riders, with stated maximums going as high as 1.90%. The optional Return of Premium Death Benefit adds 0.15%. The plain-English trade is this: the base contract is one of the lowest-cost wrappers you will find, but the total you pay depends entirely on which funds and riders you bolt on. Run the all-in number — base charge plus fund expenses plus any rider — before assuming this is a low-cost product.

Legal Entity: Nationwide Life Insurance Company

Parent: Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company

AM Best Rating: A+