Best Health Insurance in Illinois

With a score of 85 out of 100, MercyCare Health Plans offers the best health insurance in Illinois, balancing affordability, customer service and coverage. If MercyCare is unavailable in your area, Ambetter, Oscar, Health Alliance and Molina also provide excellent coverage options.

*Our picks are the best companies for 40-year-olds looking for Silver-tier plans.

While we've given our top picks overall, the best company for you may differ depending on your profile and preferred plan type. So below, we've broken down the top picks for common categories to make more personalized recommendations.

So that you can learn about our recommendations, we've broken down our top picks overall, for affordability and customer service reputation.

The following recommendations will ensure that buying health insurance that is ideal for you is easy.

Overall, our top three picks for Illinois health insurance are MercyCare Health Plans, Ambetter and Oscar. However, the best possible health insurance plan for you will vary widely depending on your personal details and coverage needs. Compare as many plans and companies as possible to get the right fit.

Below we've answered frequently asked questions about the best health insurance in Illinois:

To rank health care insurance providers in Illinois, MoneyGeek researched premiums, out-of-pocket costs, claims denial rates and plan types for each available company and compared them across different categories. We then weighted each category to calculate an overall MoneyGeek score and derive rankings.

We weighted most categories as follows:

• Maximum out-of-pocket (MOOP) score (30%): The MOOP is the most you'll pay per year for health care costs outside of your monthly premiums. The provider with the lowest average MOOP scores the highest.
• Claims denial score (30%): How often a provider denies claims. The provider with the lowest claims denial rate scores the highest.
• Rate score (20%): How much the provider's monthly plans cost. The cheapest provider, on average, gets the highest score.
• Plan type score (20%): Providers score better if they have plan types with broader coverage. A provider with many PPO plans will get the highest score.

In some cases, we adjusted the weightings as follows:

• For the categories "Best Cheap Health Insurance in Illinois" and "Best Health Insurance in Illinois for Low Income," we increased the rate score weighting to 50%. We decreased every other category by 10%.
• For the category "Best Health Insurance by Plan Type in Illinois," we decreased the plan type score weighting to 0% to reflect that we are comparing providers' plans like-for-like. We increased MOOP and claims denial score weightings by 10% each.

Sample Consumer:

MoneyGeek collected data on all available plans in Illinois for consumers aged 18, 26, 40, 50 and 60. Unless otherwise noted, all monthly premiums are for a 40-year-old buyer, such as the category for young adults. Plans analyzed in each section include the relevant cited metal tiers, which include Catastrophic, Bronze, Expanded Bronze, Silver, Gold and Platinum.