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The general rule is pretty solid - if you die first, you don't inherit anything and it passes to the next person in line according to the will or state law. The thing that gets people is when there's a "per stirpes" clause in the will, which means your kids could still inherit your share even though you died first - basically the inheritance goes down through your bloodline instead of just skipping you entirely. Worth checking the actual will language because not all of them have this, so it really depends on what the document says.
If the beneficiary dies before the person whose estate they'd inherit from, they generally don't get anything - the inheritance goes to whoever's next in line according to the will or state law. This is called "predeceasing" and it's why a lot of people update their wills every so often so everything goes where they actually want it to.
like others said, the basic rule is if you die before the person leaving you stuff in their will, you're out of luck - that inheritance passes down the line to whoever's next according to the will or intestacy laws. Where it gets interesting is if the will has what's called a "survivorship clause" that explicitly requires the beneficiary to outlive the deceased by a certain period (like 30 or 60 days), which can prevent messy situations where someone inherits and then immediately dies. There's also the concept of "per stirpes" distribution in some wills, which lets your descendants inherit what you would've gotten if you'd survived, though not all wills are set up that way. Best move is to know what your will actually says or talk to an estate attorney if you're worried about how this applies to your situation.
This is actually pretty straightforward but there's some nuance depending on the situation. As mentioned above, if you're named in someone's will and you die before they do, you generally don't inherit anything - that stuff goes to whoever's next in line. Could be another family member, could go to a charity if that's what the will says, or it gets divided up according to state law if there's no will at all.
The thing that trips people up is something called "per stirpes" vs "per capita" - basically it's about whether the inheritance goes to your kids if you die before getting it. With per stirpes, if you die before the person leaves you money and you've got kids, your share might go to them instead. But that's only if the will or trust specifically says so - otherwise nope, you're out and it goes to the next beneficiary listed. Some people also set up contingent beneficiaries in their wills specifically to handle this, like "if my son dies before me, his share goes to my daughter" or whatever.
One more thing - if you're talking about life insurance or retirement accounts with named beneficiaries, those don't even go through the will, they go straight to whoever you named. So if you named someone as your life insurance beneficiary and they die before you do, that money won't go to them obviously, which is why you're supposed to update that stuff periodically. Not everyone does though which causes headaches later.
The short answer is yeah, you're out of luck - that inheritance passes to whoever's next in line per the will or state intestacy laws. The one exception worth knowing from my paralegal experience is if there's a "per stirpes" clause in the will, your descendants might inherit your share instead, but that's gotta be spelled out explicitly.
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