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Studies show women make聽better investors聽than men, but you wouldn鈥檛 know that looking at women鈥檚 retirement accounts.|

Here are the harrowing numbers:

• Men鈥檚 average 401(k) balances are more than 50% higher than the average for women, according to a 2015 Vanguard study.
• On average, men contributed about 22% more to individual retirement accounts of all types in 2014 than women, according to recent estimates from the IRS.
• When it came to end-of-year fair market values for IRAs, the average for men was nearly $63,000 more than for women, the IRS reports.
• In 2014, nearly half of elderly unmarried women receiving Social Security relied on those benefits for 90% or more of their income, the Social Security Administration says.

What gives? Blame the pay gap that manifests itself as a retirement gap. To borrow a Beyonce-ism, perhaps it鈥檚 time for women to 鈥済et in formation鈥� and tackle this gap. Here鈥檚 where they can begin.

1. Start now

You鈥檝e heard this advice before because it鈥檚 true: The earlier you start investing, the better off you鈥檒l be when retirement comes. This is an especially important lesson for women: A聽recent NerdWallet study聽found that聽to build a comparable retirement fund, the average American woman must invest the equivalent of $1.25 from her wages for every $1 the average man invests.

Where can women begin? At work. Max out the 401(k) match if your employer offers this type of benefit. This free money will help accelerate whatever contributions you鈥檙e able to make.

If you don鈥檛 have a 401(k) match or you just want to build supplementary savings, consider a traditional or聽Roth IRA. What鈥檚 the difference? Traditional IRAs offer an upfront tax deduction, whereas Roth IRAs allow tax-free distributions in retirement.

2. Think small

Invest early, and repeatedly, but don鈥檛 forget to be prudent. In an ideal world, you鈥檇 max out retirement contributions, earmarking the annual contribution limit of $18,000 for your 401(k) and $5,500 for IRAs ($6,500 if you鈥檙e 50 or older). But that鈥檚 just not feasible for everyone.

In the real world, there are bills to pay and other near-term financial needs. Before funding a retirement nest egg, it鈥檚 best to pay down high-interest debt like credit cards or build up an emergency fund.

But once those issues are handled, even a relatively modest increase in the amount you set aside for retirement now can make a big difference later on. For instance, a person who saves $5,500 in a Roth IRA each year from age 28 to 67 will garner more than $150,000 in additional retirement savings compared with a saver who invests $4,500 annually over the same period.

Experiment with the NerdWallet聽Roth IRA calculator聽to simulate how different contributions can affect your balance at retirement.

3. Reject indecision

Hemming and hawing about how to start investing for retirement will get you nowhere. You don鈥檛 have to have your entire journey mapped out at the get-go. Changes along the way are inevitable 鈥� how you allocate investments between stocks and bonds, for example 鈥� and can switch up decisions you made previously.

One such switch might be a聽401(k) rollover, in which you take money from an old employer-sponsored plan and transfer that balance into another retirement account. Another? Converting a traditional IRA to a Roth IRA, which would bring tax advantages for some investors.

Like most of the IRA statistics collected by the IRS, women lagged behind men in doing Roth conversions. A smaller share of women than men did these in 2014, and the average amount converted 鈥� about $13,500 鈥� was almost $6,000 less than that of men.

As to why this happens, it鈥檚 possible women believe some聽common myths about IRAs. But be it misinformation or indecision, any delay in saving for retirement now will cost you down the road.

Get on track for retirement

Digging into the nuances about how, and how much, men and women save for retirement can be disheartening or motivating, depending on your perspective.

While women do face some unique challenges, they鈥檙e hardly alone. About half of American families aren鈥檛 saving enough to maintain their standard of living in retirement, according to the National Retirement Risk Index.

To get yourself on the right track, calculate聽how much you鈥檒l need for retirement聽and commit to investing toward that goal. Along the way, try bumping up the amount you save by 1% or 2% a year.

Anna-Louise Jackson is a staff writer at NerdWallet, a personal finance website. Email:ajackson@nerdwallet.com. Twitter:聽@aljax7.

The article聽3 Ways Women Can Bridge the Retirement Gap聽originally appeared on聽NerdWallet.