A single egg freezing cycle costs between $3,000 and $16,500 for the procedure itself, but that number doesn’t capture the full picture. Once you add fertility medications, annual storage, and the eventual cost of using those eggs, the realistic total ranges from roughly $10,000 to $20,000 or more per cycle. Many people need more than one cycle, and the eggs sit in storage for years. Understanding every line item helps you budget accurately and avoid surprises.
What the Cycle Fee Covers
The core cycle fee of $3,000 to $16,500 typically includes monitoring appointments during ovarian stimulation, bloodwork and ultrasounds, anesthesia, the egg retrieval procedure, embryologist fees, and the initial cryopreservation (freezing) of your eggs. The wide range reflects geography, clinic reputation, and how much gets bundled in. Clinics in major metro areas like New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles tend to land on the higher end.
This fee almost never includes fertility medications, annual storage, or extra monitoring beyond the standard protocol. Those are billed separately, and they add up fast.
Fertility Medications
For about 8 to 12 days before retrieval, you’ll inject hormones that stimulate your ovaries to produce multiple eggs at once instead of the usual one. These medications are the single biggest line item that clinics leave out of their advertised price. Costs vary depending on your dosage and protocol, but most people spend $3,000 to $6,000 on medications per cycle. Higher doses, which are more common for people over 35 or those with lower ovarian reserve, push toward the upper end.
Some pharmacies offer discount programs, and a few multi-cycle bundles let you add medications into a package price. It’s worth asking your clinic which pharmacy they recommend and whether any manufacturer rebates apply.
Pre-Cycle Testing
Before starting a cycle, you’ll need bloodwork and an ultrasound to assess your ovarian reserve, which tells the doctor roughly how many eggs your ovaries are likely to produce. The key tests include an AMH blood test ($50 to $200), an FSH blood test ($50 to $150), and an antral follicle count via ultrasound ($200 to $400). Some clinics fold these into the initial consultation fee, while others bill each test separately. Budget $200 to $600 total for diagnostics if they aren’t included.
Annual Storage Fees
Once your eggs are frozen, they’re stored in liquid nitrogen tanks at your clinic or a partner cryobank. Storage is billed annually, and while specific fees vary by facility, the typical range is $500 to $1,000 per year. If you freeze eggs at 32 and don’t use them until 38, that’s six years of storage, potentially adding $3,000 to $6,000 to your total cost. Some clinics include the first year of storage in the cycle fee, so check what’s bundled before you compare prices.
How Many Eggs You Actually Need
This is the part that often doubles or triples the total investment. Not every frozen egg will survive the thaw, fertilize successfully, develop into a viable embryo, and result in a pregnancy. Age at the time of freezing is the single biggest factor in how many eggs you need.
For women under 35, retrieving 13 or more eggs per cycle produces live birth rates of 70 to 80%. That’s a strong number, but not everyone produces that many in a single retrieval. If your first cycle yields 6 or 8 eggs, your doctor may recommend a second round to bank enough for a reasonable chance at a baby. After 35, the odds per egg decline, meaning you typically need to freeze more eggs to reach the same probability of success. Many women over 37 end up doing two or three cycles.
Each additional cycle means paying the full cycle fee and medication costs again. Two cycles at the median price point can easily push the total past $25,000 to $30,000 before storage and future use.
The Cost of Using Your Eggs Later
Freezing eggs is only half the financial commitment. When you’re ready to use them, a new set of fees kicks in. The eggs are thawed, then each one is fertilized using a technique called ICSI, where a single sperm is injected directly into the egg. ICSI costs $1,500 to $2,500. After fertilization, the embryos are cultured in the lab for several days, which adds to the overall lab fees.
The frozen embryo transfer procedure, where a selected embryo is placed into your uterus, runs $3,000 to $5,000. That covers uterine preparation medications, monitoring, the embryo thaw, and the transfer itself. All told, going from frozen eggs to a transfer attempt adds roughly $5,000 to $10,000 beyond what you already spent on freezing. If the first transfer doesn’t work, subsequent attempts carry their own costs.
Insurance Coverage
Most insurance plans do not cover elective egg freezing, which is freezing done to preserve fertility for personal or career timing reasons rather than a medical diagnosis. However, if you’re freezing eggs because a medical treatment like chemotherapy could damage your fertility, coverage is more likely. Twenty-one states now mandate insurance coverage for fertility preservation when it’s medically necessary. Those states include California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, Texas, and Washington, D.C.
Even in mandated states, the specifics vary. Some plans cover the full cycle, others only partial costs, and most still exclude elective freezing. Call your insurer directly and ask whether oocyte cryopreservation is covered under your specific plan. Don’t rely on your state’s mandate alone.
Employer-Sponsored Fertility Benefits
A growing number of companies now offer fertility benefits that can offset egg freezing costs significantly. Meta, Spotify, Lululemon, and several large tech and finance firms include egg freezing in their employee benefits packages. Spotify is notable for offering unlimited fertility benefits. The exact dollar amount and structure differ from employer to employer and depend on which fertility benefits provider the company works with.
If your employer offers a benefits package, check whether egg freezing is explicitly listed. Some plans cover the full cycle and medications, while others provide a lifetime allowance you can apply toward any fertility treatment. Even partial coverage of $10,000 to $15,000 can cut your out-of-pocket cost in half.
Financing Options
Several companies specialize in fertility loans if paying upfront isn’t realistic. Interest rates and terms vary widely. EggFund offers fixed rates starting at 6.99% with terms ranging from 24 months up to 20 years. Future Family advertises plans starting at $300 per month with rates as low as 0%. Some clinics, like CNY Fertility, offer in-house payment plans with no interest, requiring 25% down and spreading the balance over two years with a roughly $40 monthly account management fee. For qualifying applicants, the Jewish Fertility Foundation offers interest-free loans up to $15,000 repaid over three to five years.
Multi-cycle bundle programs are another option. Companies like BUNDL Fertility sell two or three-cycle packages at a single discounted upfront price, sometimes with the option to bundle in medications. This caps your total cost and removes some financial uncertainty if you end up needing more than one retrieval.
Total Cost by Scenario
To make this concrete, here’s what different situations might look like:
- One cycle, age 30, average response: $7,000 to $12,000 for the cycle, $3,000 to $6,000 for medications, $300 to $600 for pre-cycle testing, plus $500 to $1,000 per year in storage. Upfront total: roughly $10,000 to $19,000.
- Two cycles, age 36: Double the cycle and medication costs. Upfront total: roughly $20,000 to $37,000 before storage.
- Eventually using the eggs: Add $5,000 to $10,000 for thawing, fertilization, and embryo transfer when you’re ready.
The lifetime cost of freezing eggs and later using them to have a baby can realistically range from $15,000 for a best-case single cycle with employer coverage to $50,000 or more for multiple uninsured cycles followed by transfer. Getting a detailed, itemized quote from at least two clinics before committing gives you the clearest picture of where your situation falls in that range.