How much health insurance do you need in India?
About ₹10 lakh for one person in a metro, ₹20 lakh for a family of three. See cover by family and city, why employer cover isn't enough, and top-ups.
6 min read
Short answer: about ₹10 L for one person in a metro city and ₹5 L elsewhere, plus more for each family member. A metro family of three needs about ₹20 L on a family floater, of your own, not just from your employer.
How much cover for your family
The planner starts from a base for your city and adds half for a spouse and a quarter for each child, rounded up to how policies are sold:
| Household | Metro city | Other city |
|---|---|---|
| Single | ₹10 L | ₹5 L |
| Couple | ₹15 L | ₹10 L |
| Couple + 1 child | ₹20 L | ₹10 L |
| Couple + 2 children | ₹20 L | ₹10 L |
Add a separate policy for parents if they rely on you. Adding them to your floater raises everyone's premium and shares one cover between the oldest and youngest in the family.
Why cover needs to keep rising
Medical costs in India have risen faster than prices in general. If they rise 10% a year, a ₹5 L hospital bill today costs ₹13 L in 10 years and ₹33.6 L in 20.
Figure 1 from the Term vs health calculator
A ₹5 L hospital bill today, if medical costs rise 10% a year
How to read it
- 1In 10 years the same treatment costs ₹13 L.
- 2One serious illness can use up ₹20 L of cover within your working life, so review your cover every few years.
Why your employer's cover isn't enough
- It ends with the job. Lose your job, change it, or retire, and the cover stops, often when you need it most.
- It's often small. ₹3–5 lakh for the whole family covers one hospital stay, not a serious illness.
- Buying later costs more. Premiums rise with age, and a condition diagnosed meanwhile may be excluded or wait years.
So buy your own base policy while you're young and healthy, and treat employer cover as a bonus.
The cheap way to get more cover: a super top-up
A super top-up pays once your hospital bills in a year pass a threshold, the deductible. Pair a ₹5 L base policy, or your employer's cover, with a super top-up of ₹15 lakh above a ₹5 L deductible, and you have ₹20 lakh of cover for far less than a ₹20 lakh base policy would cost.
Try it with your numbersTerm or Health First?Enter your family, city and existing cover. See how much health and term cover you need, and which to buy first.
What to check in a policy
- Room rent limits. A cap on room rent can cut every other part of the claim in proportion.
- Waiting periods for conditions you already have, and for some treatments.
- Co-payment, where you pay a share of each claim, common in policies for older people.
- Claim settlement record. Insurers' claim data is published by the regulator, IRDAI.[1]
Health cover comes before term cover in most plans, because it protects you as well as your family. Is ₹1 crore of term insurance enough? covers the other half.
What this doesn't mean
- These are starting points. Hospitals you'd use, your health and your family's history can call for more.
- 10% is our assumption for illustration, not a published figure.
- No product is recommended. Compare policies on cover, exclusions and claim record, not just premium.
Cover sized as a family floater: ₹10 L base in a metro and ₹5 L elsewhere, half more for a spouse and a quarter more per child, rounded up to the next ₹5 lakh. For illustration only, not insurance advice.