How much does pet insurance cost?
In order to understand the cost of pet insurance, you have to know three key terms:
- Annual Reimbursement Limit: This is the maximum amount your pet insurance company will reimburse you each year for total pet costs.
- Annual Deductible: This is the minimum amount you have to pay out of pocket before your pet insurance company will begin annual reimbursements.
- Reimbursement Percentage: This is the percentage that your pet insurance company will reimburse you once you meet your deductible.
The cost of all three of these factors can be adjusted to fit your budget but bear in mind that adjustments to any one of those will change your monthly insurance cost.
The NAPHIA’s industry report for 2023 found that the average premium for pet insurance is $32 per month.
Let’s look at a quick example of a 13-year-old domestic long hair cat in New York:
Monthly Cost |
Annual Reimbursement Limit |
Annual Deductible |
Reimbursement Percentage |
$38.08 |
$15,000 |
$500 |
80% |
$56.41 |
$15,000 |
$100 |
70% |
$26.09 |
$15,000 |
$1,000 |
90% |
$45.82 |
Unlimited |
$750 |
90% |
$69.04 |
Unlimited |
$250 |
80% |
$35.06 |
$10,000 |
$500 |
80% |
In the table above, you’ll notice that there isn’t a significant difference in the monthly cost between the annual reimbursement limit of $10,000 versus $15,000 when all other factors are the same.
What increases the monthly cost the most is your annual deductible. So if you can choose to set aside a minimum of $500, $750, or $1,000 to cover unexpected pet care costs, it can keep your monthly costs low without compromising a high annual reimbursement limit or a high reimbursement percentage.
Below is the same example but based on a 5-year-old male Puggle dog:
Monthly Cost |
Annual Reimbursement Limit |
Annual Deductible |
Reimbursement Percentage |
$44.87 |
$15,000 |
$500 |
80% |
$66.47 |
$15,000 |
$100 |
70% |
$30.74 |
$15,000 |
$1,000 |
90% |
$54.00 |
Unlimited |
$750 |
90% |
$81.35 |
Unlimited |
$250 |
80% |
$41.31 |
$10,000 |
$500 |
80% |
Dogs are the most commonly insured pet, according to the NAPHIA’s industry report for 2023.
Now let’s look at how that impacts a real-life situation.
For a cat: Older cats are more likely to suffer from kidney disease or leukemia. The cost of blood work, tests, and medication for kidney disease amounts to $250 every 2 months.
Additional X-rays to look for leukemia are $85 each, and the blood work is $150 each time. Other costs might include prescription kidney diet food at $75 per month.
Without pet insurance, you might have to pay $2635 for kidney disease management, annual cancer X-ray/blood work, and kidney diet food, not including regular care and appointment costs.
With pet insurance, you might have to pay $500 to reach your annual deductible and $427 for the 20% you owe based on an 80% reimbursement percentage. $927 is much more affordable than $2635, especially if those are unexpected, ongoing costs for several years. This becomes even more important as your pet gets older because they are statistically more likely to develop multiple conditions requiring tests, diagnostics, and treatment.
Where you live will slightly influence the cost because the insurance rates are tied to the average cost of pet care in that state.
According to NAPHIA’s industry report for 2023, the majority of pets are insured in California, New York, and Florida.
Optional Coverages
There are optional coverage plans that you can add to your pet insurance, depending on the provider. Two of the most common are exam fees and prescription drugs. The cost for each is contingent upon the type of policy you are taking out and the type of pet you are covering.
Exam Fees
All accident and illness exam fees can be covered by adding this optional coverage to your policy. Using the cat example above, this optional policy would add $4 per month to your insurance.
Prescription Drugs
Similarly, you can add all the costs of prescription drugs for ongoing care with an optional coverage policy which, using the cat example above, adds $4.28 to your monthly cost.