The average American changes jobs roughly a dozen times in a working life.
Gif by rickandmorty on Giphy
Which means the average American should have a small museum of abandoned 401(k) accounts scattered across former employers, custodians that got acquired, and login pages that no longer exist.
And they do. Billions of dollars sit in forgotten workplace retirement accounts. Not stolen. Not lost. Just orphaned.
Somebody worked hard for that money. Then they changed jobs, meant to deal with it, and did not.
So yes, you can absolutely have multiple 401(k) accounts. Most people with a long career do.
But there are two very different versions of this question, and they have opposite answers.
Can you hold several old 401(k)s at once? Yes. As many as you have had jobs.
Can you contribute to several 401(k)s at once and get several limits? Almost never. And believing otherwise causes a specific, annoying tax mess that nobody else will catch for you.
Let's separate the two properly.