On this page
Open enrollment gives you a limited window to pick coverage for the coming year, and the plan pages all start to look alike after the third tab. A checklist keeps the comparison grounded in your actual life: your doctors, your medicines, and the care you already know you need.
Start with your doctors and hospitals
Check whether the doctors you use are in each plan network. Do this on the plan own provider directory and confirm with the office if a provider matters a lot to you, since directories can lag behind real contracts. A cheap plan that excludes your hospital turns expensive the first time you need it. If a doctor has left a network before, our piece on what to do when your doctor leaves your network covers your options.
List your medicines
Write down every regular prescription, then check each plan formulary for the tier it sits on. A medicine on a high tier can cost more each month than the premium difference between two plans. Tier placement also changes, so a drug that was cheap this year deserves a fresh check.
Add up the full year, not the month
For each plan, add twelve months of premiums to a realistic estimate of your cost sharing. Use your care from this year as the starting point, then adjust for anything already scheduled. People who expect subsidies should understand how the premium tax credit works before trusting the monthly price shown on a results page, because the credit is based on an income estimate that gets settled at tax time.
Check the details people skip
Look at whether specialist visits need a referral. Check the out-of-pocket maximum. Confirm whether your plan year deductible spending so far carries over if you are switching midyear through a special enrollment period; usually it does not. If you qualify for lower cost sharing, read about cost-sharing reductions before choosing a tier, because those savings only apply to Silver plans bought through the marketplace.
Before you submit
Review the application details once, slowly. Names, dates of birth, and income estimates should match your documents. Then save the confirmation page or email somewhere you can find it in February. Open enrollment mistakes are usually fixable, but they are far easier to fix in the week you spot them.
