We score travel insurance companies on six weighted factors, then publish the results in a table you can sort. The methodology is below. Read it before trusting any rating on this site, including ours.
One thing worth understanding before you get into the scores: most travel insurance “carriers” are brand names. The actual underwriter, the entity legally obligated to pay your claim, is often a different company. Travel Guard is AIG-owned. Allianz Travel Insurance is underwritten by Jefferson Insurance Company and BCS Insurance Company. Berkshire Hathaway Travel Protection is administered through a separate structure. When a claim gets denied and you file an appeal, the appeal goes to the underwriter, not the brand on the website. Our ratings account for that structure. A brand with a recognizable name and a weak underwriter gets no credit for the name.
Our Approach
We evaluated 20 travel insurance companies using a weighted scoring system built around what actually determines whether a policy pays when you need it. Each company was scored across six categories and curved against the top performer so the rankings reflect real competitive differences, not just which company checked the most boxes on a generic rubric.
Here’s how we weight each factor and why.
Financial Strength & Solvency (20%)
A travel insurance policy is a contractual promise to pay. The only thing backing that promise is the underwriter’s financial position. We examine AM Best ratings, statutory reserves, and parent company stability for the actual underwriting entity, not just the brand.
This is the single factor most travelers never check and most comparison sites underweight. A carrier quoting below-market premiums with a weak balance sheet is a claims-payment risk. Medical evacuation claims run $50,000 to $200,000. The underwriter has to have the capital to pay that without delay.
Customer Service (20%)
We evaluate 24/7 availability, multilingual support, average response times, and whether the company offers actual travel assistance or just a claims intake line. There’s a real difference. Assistance services that can locate a local specialist, coordinate a hospital admission, or arrange emergency transport are doing something a call center that only logs claim numbers is not.
Having worked the desk during major travel disruptions, I can tell you that the carriers who perform at 2 a.m. on a Sunday are not always the ones with the best marketing. Response time under stress, in a foreign time zone, with a sick traveler on the line. That’s the test. We weight it accordingly.
Customer Satisfaction & Reputation (20%)
We analyze verified customer reviews, NAIC complaint ratios filed with state insurance departments, and feedback patterns from travel professionals who handle claims regularly. The NAIC’s complaint index is public data. It’s one of the few objective signals available, and most comparison sites don’t use it.
Patterns matter more than individual reviews. Consistent complaints about claim denials on pre-existing condition grounds, or about delays on medical evacuation reimbursements, tell you something about how a carrier interprets its own policy language under pressure. That gets weighted here.
Affordability & Value (15%)
We compare travel insurance rates across standardized trip profiles: a 10-day international trip for a 35-year-old with $3,000 in non-refundable costs, and separately a 14-day trip for a 62-year-old with $6,000 in non-refundable costs. Premium alone isn’t the measure. Coverage limits, deductibles, and what the policy actually excludes determine whether a price is competitive or just cheap.
One framing that helps: most US travelers on international trips don’t need comprehensive trip-cancellation-plus-medical coverage. What they need most is medical evacuation coverage, because standard US health insurance, including most PPO and HMO plans, does not cover emergency evacuation back to the US. That evacuation can run $50,000 to $200,000 depending on origin. A standalone evacuation-only policy often costs $40 to $80 and covers that specific risk without bundled cancellation padding that may duplicate coverage you already have through a credit card. We factor this into value assessments. A comprehensive policy priced at $300 isn’t obviously better value than an evacuation policy at $60 if the traveler’s primary uninsured risk is evacuation.
Claims Process (15%)
We evaluate the clarity of claims procedures, documentation requirements, average processing times, and approval rates on legitimate claims. The most common claim-denial pattern in travel insurance isn’t fraud or bad faith. It’s a pre-existing condition exclusion triggered because the traveler didn’t buy the policy within the waiver window, typically 14 to 21 days from initial trip deposit, depending on the carrier. Miss that window and any medical claim with a connection to a pre-existing condition is a denial.
We also weight how carriers handle CFAR (cancel for any reason) claims. CFAR reimburses 50% to 75% of trip cost, not 100%, and must be purchased within 14 to 21 days of initial deposit. Carriers that make this clear in the purchase flow score better than those that surface it only in the policy document.
Online & Digital Experience (10%)
We assess website usability, mobile functionality, the clarity of policy information before purchase, and how easy it is to access policy documents when you’re traveling. This factor carries the least weight because it doesn’t affect whether a claim pays. But a policy document that’s hard to retrieve at midnight in a foreign hospital is a real operational problem, not just a convenience issue.
A poor digital experience on a claims submission portal, unclear required documentation, no status tracking, no acknowledgment of receipt, also correlates with slower processing times in our data. It’s a weak signal, but it’s a signal.
Our Commitment to Objectivity
Our ratings are based on independent research and analysis. We update evaluations when company performance changes, when NAIC complaint data is refreshed, or when a carrier’s underwriting structure shifts. Carrier rebrands, underwriter changes, and product discontinuations happen more often in travel insurance than in most other lines. We track those changes and update the ratings accordingly.
Compensation from carriers does not affect scores. The carriers that pay the most in affiliate commissions are not always the ones that pay the most on claims, and conflating those two things is exactly the kind of error this methodology is designed to prevent.
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