You searched for the average cost of health insurance in the UK, and this page will disappoint you on purpose: we hold no premium data of any kind. No average, no range, no survey, not one price for cover. A figure printed here would be invented, and on a financial page that does more harm than no page at all. The decision behind the search is whether to buy private medical insurance and, if so, at which settings; the figure for that is built from your own age, address and choices, and only a quote gives it. An FCA-authorised broker can put one together for your details — the form on this page reaches one, at no cost and in a few minutes. That broker does not cover the whole market, and you can go to an insurer yourself.
What it does instead is read the parts of the cost that are settled before anyone quotes you. The excess, the out-patient limit and the point at which both start again are in policy documents from four insurers, with page numbers — the figures you can pin down before you buy, and the ones an average would have hidden.
Why this page gives no average health insurance cost for the UK
Two reasons, and the second would stand even if the first fell away. The first is the one above: with nothing to average, a "health insurance UK average" from here would be invention dressed as a statistic.
The second is that an average is the wrong shape for the question. One figure standing in for a crowd earns its keep when the crowd is alike, and a premium is priced on one person's age, address and choices — the choices alone pull people far apart. One wording we hold lists six excess levels, £100 to £5,000 (Aviva, Healthier Solutions terms and conditions, April 2025 issue, page 11, read 4 September 2026); another offers either a flat excess or a 25% share of each eligible claim (WPA, Complete Health IPID, November 2025, page 2, read 4 September 2026). Average people who chose differently across those and you learn about none of them.
The monthly phrasing changes none of this: a private health insurance monthly cost is the same unknown figure in a smaller unit, and we hold nothing on how a premium is collected or whether paying by the month alters it — the monthly framing has a page of its own. What the clauses below fix, they fix by the policy year.
What the policy wording fixes, and what only a quote can tell you
Private medical insurance, private health cover, personal health insurance: different names for one product, whose cost has two kinds of part. The table sorts the figures this page holds into the two: settled in the wording, the same for every member on it, or left to the quote.
| The figure | Fixed in a wording we hold | Left to the quote |
|---|---|---|
| The premium | Nothing: no extract we hold prices cover | All of it, from your age, address and choices |
| The excess level | Aviva lists six options, £100 to £5,000, each per member every policy year (terms, page 11) | What each level does to the premium |
| How often the excess is charged | Aviva: every policy year (terms, page 11). Bupa: once in the policy year, in its worked example (guide, page 10). WPA: per policy year (IPID, page 2). Freedom: the clause we hold names no period (guide, page 31) | Nothing; this is wording, not price |
| A co-payment instead of an excess | WPA: 25% of eligible claims up to a chosen level (IPID, page 2) | The level, and the premium with it |
| The out-patient limit | WPA: £250 for specialist consultations as standard, raisable by an optional extra (IPID, page 1). Aviva: a pooled limit of £500 or £1,000 per member every policy year (terms, page 7), or a £0 option (terms, page 24) | Which option the quote is priced on, and what the extra costs |
| A second, smaller excess | Aviva: £50 each on routine dental treatment and optical benefit (terms, page 11) | Whether those benefits are on the policy at all |
Aviva's figures are from its Healthier Solutions terms and conditions (April 2025 issue), Bupa's from the Bupa By You policy guide (BINS 14718, 2024), WPA's from its Complete Health IPID (November 2025) and Freedom's from the Freedom Elite Policyholder's Guide to Cover (April 2025), all read on 4 September 2026. Each is one clause from one document, and none describes a policy you have been offered. When a quote arrives, ask which excess level and out-patient option it was priced on.
The excess: six figures one wording lists, and what they do to a bill
The excess is the slice of eligible treatment you pay before the insurer pays, and it is the clearest cost settled in advance — on the wording we hold it is a row of options:
"Excess options £100 Benefits covered under this policy will be subject to an excess payable for each member every policy year. £200 £500 £1,000 £3,000 £5,000"
— Aviva, Healthier Solutions terms and conditions (April 2025 issue), page 11, read 4 September 2026. The copy we read sits in an intermediary's document library. Aviva's own site carried a March 2026 issue when we looked on 9 October 2026; nothing on this page has been checked against it, so every Aviva clause here is the April 2025 wording.
Read as a buyer rather than a claimant, the row gives six sums, any one of which you could be asked for in a policy year; it attaches the sum to one person, so a policy covering two people carries two of them; and it says nothing about what choosing £100 rather than £5,000 does to the premium. That silence is the line between the table's two columns. The next page of the terms says what the insurer does once the excess has been met:
"Excess If you have chosen an excess, we will pay benefits up to the amounts shown after the excess has been paid"
— Aviva, Healthier Solutions terms and conditions (April 2025 issue), page 12, read 4 September 2026.
"Up to the amounts shown" is the hinge: paying the excess opens the benefit table, each benefit's own limit still standing, not the whole policy. The same page runs the sums three times, each quoted in full elsewhere on this site (page 12, April 2025 issue, read 4 September 2026). One sets £10,000 of treatment in a policy year against a £5,000 excess: the member pays the first £5,000, Aviva the rest (on what private health insurance costs per year). One has a £1,000 bill meeting a £1,000 excess, so the whole bill is the member's (on what private health insurance costs a teacher). The third puts a £200 excess under a benefit capped at £500: the £200 comes first, then at most £500 from Aviva for that benefit that policy year (also on the yearly-cost page).
The other three wordings fix the excess with less arithmetic. Bupa's guide follows a member called Helen through a £250 physiotherapy bill against a £100 excess: Bupa pays the physiotherapist £150, Helen the remaining £100, and further treatment in the same policy year brings no second excess (Bupa By You policy guide, BINS 14718, 2024, page 10, read 4 September 2026; the example is set out whole on how much excess should you choose). Freedom's guide takes the excess off the first valid invoice and off later ones until the whole amount has been applied, then has you pay that amount to the provider, and names no period at all (Freedom Elite Policyholder's Guide to Cover, April 2025, page 31, read 4 September 2026; also on that page). WPA's product summary puts two mechanisms in one clause:
"Where an excess is chosen, you must pay your excess for eligible treatment up to your chosen level per Policy year before we provide benefit. Where Shared Responsibility (co-payment) has been selected, you must pay 25% of claims for eligible treatment up to your chosen level of Shared Responsibility."
— WPA, Complete Health Insurance Product Information Document (November 2025), page 2, read 4 September 2026.
For a reader after an average, the WPA clause is the one to sit with: it puts two members of one product on different shapes of cost. One pays eligible bills in full up to a chosen level per policy year before benefit begins; the other pays 25% of every eligible claim up to a chosen ceiling. Neither is a cap on the year — the clause says what the member pays before and alongside benefit, not that the policy then pays without limit — and no single figure describes both. The clause does not say what period the Shared Responsibility ceiling runs over, so ask if you are offered it. Nor does every use of a policy start the excess: Bupa keeps its Direct Access phone or video assessment clear of both the excess and the out-patient allowance, where the policy has either (Bupa By You policy guide, BINS 14718, 2024, page 7, read 4 September 2026; quoted on private health insurance benefit limits explained).
What each level does to your premium is the figure no document we hold gives. Ask a broker or an insurer to quote at two of the levels offered, and the gap between them is the price of that choice in your own numbers rather than a crowd's. The form on this page carries that request to an FCA-authorised broker at no charge.
The out-patient limit: the other figure settled before the price
On these wordings an excess is where the insurer's money starts and a benefit limit is where it stops. Two of the wordings fix such a figure in advance, differently. WPA's is a cap built in as standard:
"Out-patient Treatment Consultations with a Specialist – £250 (increase with the Extra Out-patient Consultations Optional Extra)"
— WPA, Complete Health Insurance Product Information Document (November 2025), page 1, read 4 September 2026.
£250 is the figure, consultations with a specialist are what it counts, and an optional extra can raise it at a price the summary does not give. The row does not say what period the £250 covers, and an information document is a summary rather than the policy, so take that to WPA's full wording. Aviva's figure is an option rather than a standard cap, and choosing it does more than lower a ceiling:
"If you have chosen a reduced out-patient limit of £500 or £1,000 you are not covered as an in-patient, day-patient, or out-patient for treatment for: complications of pregnancy and childbirth, or surgical procedures on the teeth performed in a hospital"
— Aviva, Healthier Solutions terms and conditions (April 2025 issue), page 8, read 4 September 2026.
This clause should stop anyone reading a lower figure as the same policy at a better price: the £500 or £1,000 option removes two kinds of treatment in every setting, in-patient included, so what has been bought changes shape and not only size. The limit itself is pooled — a set of out-patient benefits draws on one limit of £500 or £1,000, counted per member and per policy year, and which benefits are in the set is not in our extract (same terms, page 7, read 4 September 2026; the yearly-cost page quotes the row). A third option, reduced out-patient cover £0 limit, covers no out-patient treatment, consultations and diagnostic tests among it (same terms, page 24, read 4 September 2026). A further clause carves out one exception, out-patient treatment through some of Aviva's networks, which it does not identify (same terms, page 8, read 4 September 2026). Both are quoted on what a policy pays at a private hospital.
On the Aviva wording a limit keeps costing after the excess has stopped: once the pooled limit is spent, that category's bills are yours until the policy year turns, however small the excess, and the two stack in one year, as the £200 and £500 example above shows.
What starts again each policy year
Every period named in the clauses above is the policy year — the third thing fixed before you buy: not only how much, but how often. On the Aviva, Bupa and WPA wordings a new year brings a new excess and a fresh limit, and Aviva says so for treatment that crosses the date: a course still running when the next policy year begins meets the excess again, the member in its example paying the first £5,000 over (Healthier Solutions terms, April 2025 issue, page 12, read 4 September 2026; the clause is quoted on what private health insurance costs per year). Freedom's clause names no period, so do not carry a yearly reset across to it.
What the premium does at renewal is the other half of what a new year means, and no clause we hold touches it. What to expect at renewal covers the notice when it comes.
Two smaller excesses on the same page, easy to miss
When the question is the headline price, small figures get skipped, and Aviva's terms fix two on the page that lists the main excess. Routine dental treatment and the optical benefit each carry a £50 excess of their own (Healthier Solutions terms, April 2025 issue, page 11, read 4 September 2026; the row is quoted on the yearly-cost page), and the terms show one at work:
"For example, if a claim is made for £220 for routine dental treatment covered by the policy, we will deduct the £50 excess from this sum and pay the balance of £170 to you"
— Aviva, Healthier Solutions terms and conditions (April 2025 issue), page 11, read 4 September 2026.
Two things set this smaller excess apart. Here the insurer keeps the £50 back from what it sends the member, where in Bupa's example and Freedom's clause the member hands the excess to whoever treated them. And nothing in the dental and optical row says how often the £50 falls due: a fixed figure with an unfixed frequency is worth one more question before you sign.
How to get a figure that is yours rather than an average
The honest route to "how much is private health insurance on average" is to stop asking for the average and ask for the parts. Put these questions beside any figure you are given.
- Which excess level is this price built on, and what is the same cover one level up and one down?
- Is the excess per person, and how often is it charged?
- What does the out-patient figure count, what period does it run over, and does choosing it remove anything?
- Is there a co-payment instead of, or alongside, the excess, and what period does its ceiling run over?
- Do dental or optical benefits carry an excess of their own, and how often does it fall due?
- Which issue of the terms is this quote on? The Aviva wording here is April 2025, and a March 2026 issue has since appeared.
A premium with those six answers beside it is a cost you can read; on its own it leaves out the rest of the policy, and an average leaves out you as well.
Questions people ask about the average cost of health insurance
How much is private health insurance in the UK on average?
We cannot say, and will not guess: no premium data is held here, so there is no average, range, starting price or "normal" figure on this site, and one would not describe you anyway. A premium is built from your own age, address and the options you choose, and those options alone put two people on one product far apart: a £100 excess or £5,000 on Aviva's list, a flat excess or 25% of each eligible claim on WPA's (Aviva, Healthier Solutions terms, April 2025 issue, page 11; WPA, Complete Health IPID, November 2025, page 2). A typical health insurance cost for the UK would average those two together and describe neither.
What is the average monthly cost of health insurance?
The same answer in a smaller unit: no figure, and nothing we hold deals with how a premium is collected. What the clauses fix is counted by the policy year, so a monthly figure on its own says nothing about the excess or the limit that year carries; what private health insurance costs per year reads the year.
How much is private healthcare in the UK on average?
A different number: what a hospital or consultant charges a patient who pays for treatment themselves, not what cover costs. This page holds neither. Private treatment and the NHS carries hospitals' published cash prices for a set of operations, labelled as such, and what a policy pays at a private hospital covers the insurer's side of a hospital bill.
What is the average cost of health insurance per person?
We hold no per-person premium. What is per person in the wording is the excess and the limit: on Aviva's terms both are "for each member", so a family policy carries one of each per member, every policy year (Healthier Solutions terms, April 2025 issue, pages 11 and 7). Private health insurance for a family works through what that means.
What does a group health insurance scheme cost on average?
We hold no group premium data, and nothing on this page concerns a group scheme. Whether a scheme carries an excess or out-patient limit shaped like the ones above is a question for its own documents; there is a separate page on what group health insurance costs.
What is the average health insurance broker commission?
We hold no commission figures, average or otherwise. This site is not a broker and is not FCA-authorised: it introduces readers to one FCA-authorised broker and may be paid for the introduction. Who pays health insurance brokers sets out how that works.
What does the cheapest private health insurance cost per month?
We hold no price for it, and nothing linking any option to a premium. What we can say is that on Aviva's wording the reduced out-patient option removes two kinds of cover in every setting (Healthier Solutions terms, April 2025 issue, page 8), so if a lower figure comes with a reduced limit, ask what it takes away before comparing it with a higher one. There is more on the cheapest private health insurance in the UK.
The figure that is yours is a quote, and this page has shown which parts of it are already fixed. To reach an FCA-authorised broker who can price cover on your own age, address and choices, use the form on this page.