How much do I need in my superannuation to earn $10,000 passive income every month?

In Australia, superannuation is a popular tool to build wealth for retirement. It's tax effective too, and you can also use your superannuation to build a passive income to live off in your retirement years. But by investing your superannuation wisely, you will benefit from lower tax rates, compound growth, and then eventually a retirement lifestyle boosted by a tax-free passive income. The question is, how much do you actually need in your superannuation to receive the passive income you want? Let's break it down, using $10,000 per month as an example. Image source: Getty Images How much superannuation do I need to earn $10,000 of monthly passive income? First, you need to work out what $10,000 in passive income every month totals over the year. So, $10,000 x 12 = $120,000. Then you need to divide your annual passive income by the dividend yield of your overall portfolio. For example, $120,000 ÷ 2% = $6 million (that's the portfolio size you'd need). The only catch is that the answer varies depending on your dividend yield. That means a super portfolio with a dividend yield of around 4% only needs to be half the size of one with a dividend yield of around 2% to generate the same level of passive income. Which is good news because a $6 million superannuation balance is out of reach for the majority of Australians. Ok, so how much do I need to earn $10,000 off a 4%, 5% or 6% yielding portfolio? We already know what portfolio size you'd need to earn $12,000 per year (the equivalent of $10,000 per month) off a 2% yielding account. But if your overall portfolio has a slightly higher dividend yield of around 4%, you'll need a balance of around $3 million to earn the same $120,000 per year in passive income. If the yield of your portfolio is higher still, at around 5% for example, your balance would need to be closer to $2.4 million to earn the same dividend income. For a 6% yielding portfolio, you'd need a superannuation balance closer to $2 million to earn the same amount again. And so on… You'd still earn $120,000 per year in passive income from each of these superannuation balance sizes. I'm aiming for a 5% yielding superannuation portfolio, which ASX shares can I invest in? To earn a $120,000 passive income off a 5% yielding portfolio, you'd need around $2.4 million saved. But note, if you want a portfolio yielding around 5%, it doesn't mean that every investment in your portfolio has to yield that level. It can be a combination that yields 5% overall. These are my top picks. Defensive shares like Telstra Group Ltd ( ASX: TLS ), Sonic Healthcare Ltd ( ASX: SHL ), Origin Energy Ltd ( ASX: ORG ) or Amcor PLC ( ASX: AMC ) are a solid choice for income-seeking investors. These all yield around the 5% to 6% level, at the time of writing. Non-discretionary ASX consumer staples stocks are also naturally defensive, but many of them yield slightly less. Supermarket giants like Woolworths Group Ltd ( ASX: WOW ) and Coles Group Ltd ( ASX: COL ) can generate stable cash flow across all phases of the economic cycle. This translates to consistent dividends for shareholders. These shares pay around 3%, at the time of writing. Then there are your popular ASX mining shares . These are more cyclical, but such stocks usually rebound strongly during recovery. BHP Group Ltd ( ASX: BHP ), Fortescue Ltd ( ASX: FMG ) and Rio Tinto Ltd ( ASX: RIO ) are popular options. These yield anywhere between 3.5% and 6.5% at the time of writing.