What short-term cover is — and is not
A short-term, limited-duration plan is temporary health insurance for a defined gap: the months between leaving one job and starting the next, the wait before a new employer's cover begins, or the period after a move before a new plan is in place. It is sold as a bridge, and it should be judged as one — by whether it spans the gap, and by what falls through it. The gap is usually measured in weeks or months, and the plan is bought for that length, not as a substitute for a year's cover. A plan bought for a gap that turns out to be longer than the plan is a plan that stops helping at the worst moment.
What it is not is ACA cover, and the differences are the whole story. Short-term plans do not fall under the Affordable Care Act's rules, so they do not have to cover pre-existing conditions — they are medically underwritten and can turn an applicant down, or exclude a condition. They do not have to cover essential health benefits: maternity care, mental health and substance-use treatment, and prescription drug cover are often missing or thin. They cannot be bought with premium tax credits, so the price you see is the price you pay, with no subsidy to bring it down. And they are not guaranteed renewable: a plan that ends is a plan that ends, and a condition diagnosed during the plan can become a pre-existing condition for the next application.
The underwriting is the part buyers most often underestimate. An ACA marketplace plan cannot turn you down for a health condition, and cannot charge you more for one. A short-term plan can do both: it can decline the application, exclude the condition, charge more, or impose a waiting period before the condition is covered. An applicant who is healthy at the point of application may not stay healthy for the length of the plan, and a condition that appears during the plan may not be covered when it matters most. That is not a flaw in a particular short-term plan; it is the product's design, and it is why the price is lower.
How long it lasts: the federal rule and the pause
The federal position has moved twice in two years, and the current position is unsettled. A 2024 federal rule caps new short-term policies sold on or after 1 September 2024 at a 3-month initial contract term, with a maximum total duration of 4 months including any renewal. On 7 August 2025, the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and the Treasury announced they will not prioritise enforcement of that cap while a new rule is drafted — so in practice, state law now largely determines how long a plan can last, and durations vary widely by state: some states cap a plan at a few months, others allow a year or longer. A proposed replacement rule has been under White House review since May 2026 and had not been published as of early October 2026, so the uncertainty continues.
The practical consequence is that the duration on the policy in front of you matters more than the federal rule. A plan sold in one state may last 364 days with renewals to 36 months, because that state's law allows it and the federal cap is not being enforced; the same insurer's plan in another state may last three months, because that state's law caps it there. The site's temporary short-term guide explains the federal position in full, and the state pages linked below give the position state by state. Before buying, read the policy's own end date and renewal terms: a plan that can be renewed is not the same as a plan that will be renewed, and a plan that ends mid-treatment leaves the treatment uncovered unless another plan starts the same day.
The 30-day plan deserves a paragraph of its own, because it is the same product on a shorter clock. A 30-day plan is a short-term plan bought for one month — the same underwriting, the same exclusions, the same limits, on a shorter term. It fits a gap measured in weeks: the days between a job ending and a new employer's cover starting, for example. The checks are the same as for any short-term plan, with one extra: confirm the exact end date, whether the plan renews, and what happens if the gap runs longer than 30 days. A gap that stretches past the plan's end is the point at which a short-term plan stops helping, and a 30-day plan reaches that point faster than any other.
Where short-term plans are not sold
Short-term plans are not available everywhere. As of 2026, there are 14 states plus Washington, DC where no short-term plans are available, either because the state bans them outright or because state rules are strict enough that no insurer chooses to sell there. Five states ban short-term sales outright: California, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York. The other nine states plus DC — Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maine, Minnesota, New Mexico, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington — have rules strict enough that no short-term plans tend to be offered there, even though there is no outright ban in most of them. The full list is: California, Colorado, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington.
The reasons differ by state, and they are worth understanding rather than memorising. New York requires every individual plan to be guaranteed renewable and comprehensive, with essential health benefits — which a limited-term plan cannot be — so short-term plans cannot be sold there, and the state clarified after the 2018 federal short-term rules that it would continue to prohibit their sale. California banned the sale of short-term plans in 2018. Illinois banned them outright from 1 January 2025, the first state to do so by a law of that kind. In the other states the mechanism is usually a rule that short-term plans must meet ACA-style requirements — covering pre-existing conditions, or providing essential benefits — which removes the reason an insurer would sell one. The result is the same in all fifteen jurisdictions: there is no short-term plan to buy.
The list changes over time, and it changes in both directions: Illinois joined it in 2025, and a repeal bill there did not advance in 2026. A reader who lives in one of the fifteen jurisdictions and needs cover for a gap should not shop for a short-term plan in another state — it is the sale in your state that is prohibited, and a plan that is not sold where you live cannot be your cover there. The alternatives section below is the route for those states, and the state programme pages on this site name the short-term position for their state, so a reader in Minnesota, Rhode Island or New Mexico will find the position stated on that state's page.
What it covers, what it leaves out, and what it costs
What a short-term plan covers depends on the plan, and the variation is wider than for ACA plans, because there is no required benefit list. Most short-term plans cover some doctor visits, emergency care and hospitalisation, but the limits, the deductibles and the exclusions are set by the insurer, and they are often thin where it matters: prescription drugs may be limited or excluded, maternity care is commonly excluded, mental health and substance-use treatment may be missing, and preventive care may not be covered at all. Some plans cap what they pay per day, per visit or per condition, so a hospital stay can reach the cap long before the treatment ends. Read the benefit schedule, not the advertisement: the advertisement describes the plan at its best, and the schedule describes it as it is.
The exclusions are the other half of the cover, and they are where short-term plans differ most from ACA plans. Pre-existing conditions are the largest exclusion: a condition you had before the plan started can be excluded entirely, or covered only after a waiting period, or covered with a limit that makes the cover nominal. The plan's definition of pre-existing matters — some plans look back only a few years, others further — and a condition diagnosed during the plan can be treated as pre-existing when the plan renews or when you apply for the next one. Other common exclusions include maternity, mental health treatment, prescription drugs, preventive care and, in some plans, injuries from hazardous activities. None of this is hidden, but it is written in the policy, not on the sales page.
No price is quoted here, because prices vary by age, term, deductible and state, and any single figure would be out of date before it was read. The honest statement is comparative: short-term plans are usually cheaper per month than an ACA plan, and the reason is the cover, not the market. A plan that can exclude a pre-existing condition, skip maternity and mental-health benefits, cap what it pays, and end after a few months costs less to provide — and the saving is paid for by the buyer in the form of gaps. Compare on total exposure instead: the premium, the deductible, the out-of-pocket maximum if there is one, the benefits the plan does not cover at all, and what a single uncovered event — a hospital stay, a new prescription, a complication of a condition the plan excluded — would cost you. The cheapest short-term plan is usually the thinnest one, so comparing on premium alone is the mistake the product is designed to invite.
State pages on this site
This hub ties together the short-term pages on this site. The temporary short-term guide is the lead explainer: it covers the federal duration rule, the 30-day case and the New York position in full, and it is the page to read first if you are deciding whether a short-term plan fits your gap at all. The Florida page explains short-term cover in Florida, where the duration question and the regulator's pages need checking before buying. The Texas page explains short-term cover in Texas, where state law allows initial terms of under 12 months and total duration of up to 36 months, though most policies on sale are shorter and the state regulator's own pages still showed three months as of early 2026. Each state page states the position for its state and links back here for the general rules.
Two further states now have their own pages. Georgia allows short-term plans with an initial term of 364 days and total duration of up to 36 months with renewals, according to healthinsurance.org's state-by-state table, and ValuePenguin lists Georgia among the states where plans run up to three years — Georgia itself sets no state duration limit beyond the federal rules. Ohio allows short-term plans up to 364 days with no renewals, a total of 52 weeks, according to the same healthinsurance.org table; the three-month initial and four-month total limits are the 2024 federal rule's, not the Ohio bulletin's — Ohio Department of Insurance Bulletin 2018-05 instead sets compliance requirements for non-renewable plans. Each state page states the position for its state and links back here for the general rules. Florida's short-term rules are on its state page - see short-term health insurance in Florida. Texas has its own short-term page - see short-term health insurance in Texas.
Alternatives to a short-term plan
Before buying a short-term plan, check the three alternatives that cover more. An ACA marketplace plan through a special enrollment period, if a qualifying life event opened one — losing other cover is the common trigger, and the site's enrollment and subsidies guide walks through the route while the subsidy calculator estimates what a premium tax credit would do to the monthly cost. COBRA, which continues the old employer's plan for a limited time at the full premium plus an administration charge, keeping the same cover and network — expensive, but comprehensive, and the right choice when treatment is already under way. And Medicaid, if income and household size qualify, which has no open-enrollment window and covers more than any short-term plan. The site's Medicaid eligibility guide and its checker explain the income rules, and the state programme pages name whether the state has expanded Medicaid — Minnesota, Rhode Island, New Mexico, Oregon and Idaho have, Tennessee has not.
The comparison to make is not premium against premium. It is total exposure against total exposure, and length of cover against length of gap. An ACA plan that costs more per month but covers the whole gap, covers pre-existing conditions, covers essential benefits, and can be bought with a tax credit may cost less in total than a short-term plan that costs less per month but leaves a hospital stay uncovered. A short-term plan is the right tool when the gap is short, the buyer is healthy, the alternatives are genuinely unavailable, and the buyer has read the exclusions and accepted them. It is the wrong tool when the gap is long, when treatment is already under way, when a pre-existing condition matters, or when an ACA special enrollment period is open and has not been checked. A sharing ministry is another alternative people consider, and it is explained in best alternative to health insurance for Christians. Temporary cover is the same product under another name - see temporary short-term insurance.
Worked example
Consider an ILLUSTRATIVE reader between jobs with a six-week gap before a new employer's cover starts. A 30-day short-term plan covers the first month but ends before the new cover begins, leaving two uncovered weeks — and if a condition is diagnosed in that first month, the plan's pre-existing-condition exclusion may follow the reader into the next application. The ACA special enrollment route, by contrast, covers the whole gap with comprehensive benefits, if the job loss opened a special enrollment period. The example's value is the comparison — length of the gap against length of the plan, and what the plan excludes — not any premium in it, and no real plan or price is named. A second ILLUSTRATIVE reader lives in New York and has the same six-week gap: there is no short-term plan to buy, because New York prohibits their sale, so the routes are an ACA plan through the state's marketplace, COBRA continuation of the employer's plan, or Medicaid. The two readers had the same gap and the same need, and their options were different because their states were different.