This is an updated version of an article originally posted in April 2013.
The cost of birth control pills can vary greatly. Often the cost is free if covered by your insurance.
But if you are trying to pay cash — maybe you are uninsured, or you don’t want your parents to know, or maybe your insurance doesn’t cover the kind you prefer — they can be much more expensive.
Covered by insurance or not, there are a few things you need to know about how pricing works, and where you’ll pay a lot or a little. It’s different depending on your insurance, on your pill and your pharmacy.
One common kind of birth-control pill is the combination pill, which contains two hormones, progestin and estrogen. According to drugs.com, these are the most commonly reviewed and highly rated birth-control pills in the United States:
- Lo Loestrin Fe
- Sprintec
- Yaz
- Junel Fe 1/20
- Tri-Sprintec
- Loestrin 24 Fe
- Microgestin Fe
- Yasmin
- Aviane
- Xulane
They typically come in in 21-day packs (with 21 active tablets) or 28-day packs (with 21 active tablets and 7 inactive tablets)
The other common type is the “mini-pill,” which contains only progestin. As of March 2024, the Opill mini-pill is available over the counter, in pharmacies, retailers and online. We found it for anywhere from $16.66 to $27.69 for a 28-day (one-month) supply; it also comes in value packs of three or four months for a much lower per-month price. Oh, and you can also order via Uber Eats or Doordash.
Less common are the extended-cycle pills such as Seasonique, which is sold in packs containing 84 active tablets and 7 inactive tablets (to remind you when to start again).
Shop around
When you need to fill a prescription, it pays to shop around. Many people are surprised to find how much prices vary, not just for birth-control pills but for a lot of other prescriptions. This is true at both big chains and small neighborhood pharmacies. There’s advice about buying prescriptions on our reference page on the topic.
While the cost of birth control is supposed to be covered under the Affordable Care Act, we know a lot of people aren’t insured — or maybe they choose to buy without insurance (for example, if you don’t want your mom to know).
We did some thorough once on birth control cost in the tri-state area (New York, New Jersey and Connecticut) by calling drugstores — chains and independents. Price differences were shocking! For example, with respect to birth-control pills:
• One popular birth control pill, Tri-Sprintec 28, ranged from $9 to $63 for a month, depending on where you shop.
• Another common one, Yaz-28, ranged from $68 to $112.
• GoodRX told us that Beyaz could cost $1.92 or $184. Or $44.13, or $83.89. (See screenshot.)
Here is a description of the survey. We made this birth control cost interactive map in partnership with New York’s award-winning radio show, WNYC, but it’s no longer available.
$2.41 to $12.50
Generic Microgestin can cost from $2.41 to $12.50 a month on cash in the New York suburbs, according to GoodRX.
Generic Beyaz, GoodRX told us, costs from $33.03 to $99.02 a month on cash in the same area.
Lo Loestrin Fe, we learned on GoodRX, could cost from $187.41 to $206.63 in the New York City suburbs.
One of our not-so-secret weapons in the fight against high medication costs is Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drugs, a registered pharmaceutical wholesaler that buys drugs directly from manufacturers, bypassing middlemen to lower the cost. They are online only, and they carry almost exclusively generics for now.
In the hunt for birth-control pills, that’s a good thing, because many are generics. If you look at the prices for birth-control pills at Cost Plus, you’ll see generics from $6 or $7 up to about $48 for a month. One month of generic Beyaz is $47.54 at Mark Cuban as of November 2024. (They also sell hormonal patches and the Nuva-ring.) You need a prescription, and you can order online. They have what they describe as a standard, transparent 15% markup on all drugs, and you pay shipping as well.
It’s also common to hear people say they got an excellent price on medications shopping at the big-box store Costco. You do not have to be a member to use the pharmacy, but membership will give you better prices. There is also a Member Prescription Program. One month of generic Beyaz is $56.79 at Costco as of November 2024.
Insurance can make things more expensive
Here’s another thing: If you’re insured, you might be surprised to find out that prescriptions can sometimes be filled for less by paying out-of-pocket. Here are some stories: These are not birth-control pills, but it shows how random drug pricing can be.
- Here’s a blog post we wrote about a man who found that a prescription would cost $12.10 without insurance, and $38 with.
- Here’s an article about an internist who sends patients to Costco to buy their prescriptions without invoking their insurance.
- Here’s a story about a common generic that costs $56.55 with insurance, or $13.60 without at Mark Cuban Cost Plus.
We recommend that you always ask about discounts. We had one pharmacist in New Haven tell us that he’d bring a $30 birth-control prescription down to $20 if the uninsured customer couldn’t afford it. That’s one of the perks about your local, independent neighborhood drug store.
Doctor visit likely
Also, don’t forget that you’re likely to have a doctor visit to get the prescription.
In-person visits are not the only option: Online companies Hers, Hey Doctor, Nurx, Pandia Health, Favor, PillPack, Planned Parenthood Direct, PRJKT RUBY, and Twentyeight Health will prescribe online; what you need to do and whether you can order depends on where you live. The different services have different charges, available brands and delivery methods. There’s more detail in Bedsider’s “How to get it” guide.
If you’re going to go online and skip the in-person visit, keep in mind that birth-control pills often have side effects, so having a clinician involved can be very useful. (Ask us how we know.)
For in-person visits, Planned Parenthood is on a sliding scale based on income; many cities and states have health care options for people without a lot of money.
In Los Angeles, LA Care has its mission to “provide access to quality health care for Los Angeles County’s vulnerable and low-income communities and residents and to support the safety net required to achieve that purpose.”
In New York City, NYC Care “is a health care access program that guarantees low-cost and no-cost services to New Yorkers who do not qualify for or cannot afford health insurance. All NYC Care services are provided through NYC Health + Hospitals.”
The Door Adolescent Health Center “offers NYC young people ages 12 to 24 no-cost, confidential health services in a diverse and caring setting.“ Also in New York, the Community Healthcare Network accepts teenage patients at some locations.
There is likely to be a clinic in your area; Bedsider has a search function for providers of birth control and related services. It seems some of the links are broken, but they do say they vet providers, so this is one place to start.
Ask about the cash price. Even if you’re insured.
We have heard a lot from people whose insurance policies charge them a copay for medications that might be more expensive than paying cash. For example, if your policy imposes a $25 copay for all generics, but you could buy that medication for $9, you would want to know.
Yes, birth control pills are supposed to be covered under the Affordable Care Act. We hear from people who say “my pill is not on their plan” or “I’m not taking it for birth control, but for other reasons, so my insurer won’t cover it.”
Birth control cost comparison shopping
If you’re comparison shopping, you could take a look at the resources on our “How to save on prescriptions” page.
One good place to start is Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drugs. As noted above, they purchase wholesale, add a 15% markup and send to you by mail. They have mostly generics at this point. There is a shipping fee also.
Another place is goodrx.com. This easy-to-navigate website allows you to punch in the prescription you need with the city you live in. Voila — it returns a full list of price comparisons at local drug stores. The site offers discount coupons — but they’re not always accepted at your local store.
Here’s another: Blink Health. It’s dealing with generics for now. But be cautious: These sites will tell you they are finding the lowest price, but is it really? The price that’s suggested to you with the coupon may not be available once you get there — we hear frequently that pharmacy managers don’t accept all coupons or drug discount cards given to them.
Also, Costco generally has low prices. You do not have to be a Costco member to use the pharmacy, but there is a pharmacy discount plan for members. Here is a Costco pharmacy pricing page. (This page also included prices for other retailers when we searched; it’s not clear to us that these prices are reliable, though.)
These are all great resources, but they should be used with skepticism. During our phone reporting, we found several pharmacy prices listed online were outdated or inaccurate.
Price lists from New York pharmacies
In New York, pharmacies are required to supply price lists to consumers on request: “Every pharmacy that sells drugs at retail must make Drug Retail Price Lists available” for the top 150 sellers, according to the New York State pharmacy regulation Web site. “Pharmacies should update their lists at least weekly. Consumers may request a computer-generated list to take with them when they leave the pharmacy.”
We have consistently found that pharmacies are able to supply the list, or a price over the phone. But sometimes those lists are hard to see in the store. Also, those lists can have mistakes. In one case, we called a Brooklyn pharmacy with a price listing of $467 for one pack of a common birth-control pill. When we asked if the cash-pay price was really that much, they checked their database and sheepishly told us the price was actually $93. Apparently their software had “miscalculated.”
A friend who’s an adolescent medicine specialist writes: “I love small-town, individually-owned pharmacies, but many of my patients use Target for Orthocyclen/Sprintec/Mononessa or their Tri sisters. There aren’t many Wal-Marts around here, so I haven’t had experience with them, but their website does list it on their inexpensive med list. Both companies’ websites have long lists of generic drugs available for $4-12/month supply and even bigger discounts for 90-day supply.”
GoodRX shows generic Orthocyclen, Sprintec or Mononessa for $2 to $22 a month;.
Why does this price range exist, anyway?
Why does the price vary so much? Pill prices aren’t like the price of strawberries, which depends on a good harvest.
Our partner Lee Zurik at WVUE Fox 8 Live in New Orleans did a series on the vagaries of prescription pricing, documenting multiple times when patients paid more for their medications when using their insurance cards than they would have by paying cash.
According to a story in The Los Angeles Times by David Lazarus, brand-name drugs will always carry the highest prices possible — mostly due to millions of dollars in research and development costs — while generic drugs are a little trickier.
Lazarus quoted Bob Toomajian, who worked for 16 years as Kaiser Permanente’s drug purchasing manager for Southern California, saying: “A lot of the prices for generics can’t be justified. Manufacturers are basically starting with the exorbitant prices that the branded guys charged and then setting their own prices at whatever level they think the market will bear.”
Moral of the story: prescription pricing websites are great, but it’s always best to get your quotes from the horse’s mouth. So make a phone call before rushing out the door for that $9 birth control prescription.
There’s advice about buying prescriptions on our “How to save on prescriptions” page.
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