No matter how well you prepare, travel plans don’t always go as expected. Some travelers buy travel insurance to protect their investment in prepaid travel costs. Amid the ongoing pandemic, exploring travel insurance with COVID-19 coverage is recommended. With the right policy, you can protect yourself if you need to cancel your trip or end it early due to illness. Many insurers offer travel insurance policies with this kind of coverage.

This is the shortlist of the best travel insurance for COVID options:

Berkshire Hathaway Travel Protection.

IMG.

John Hancock Insurance Agency, Inc.

Seven Corners.

Travelex Insurance Services.

Travel Insured International.

Tin Leg.

WorldTrips.

Factors we considered when picking travel insurance that covers COVID

We used the following factors to choose insurance providers to highlight in our best travel insurance for COVID list:

Range of coverage: We looked at how many plans each company offered with COVID-19 coverage, plus the range of available plans.

Depth of coverage: We compared the maximum caps for trip cancellation and trip interruption claims between carriers and plans.

Medical benefits: We examined whether plans included emergency medical benefits for COVID-19 reasons and whether plans included medical evacuation and repatriation benefits.

Cost: We determined an average cost for shoppers to benchmark plan prices by looking at the basic coverage costs for plans with COVID-19 benefits across multiple companies.

An overview of the best travel insurance for COVID

We looked at quotes from various companies for a six-night trip in May 2023 to Croatia. The traveler was 30 years old, from Texas and planned to spend $1,500 on the trip, including airfare.

On average, the price of each company’s most basic coverage plan with COVID-19 coverage was $47.22. The prices listed below are for the most basic COVID-19 travel insurance coverage. All insurers offer multiple COVID-19 policies with greater coverage coming at a higher cost.

Top travel insurance for COVID options

Let's take a closer look at our eight recommendations for travel insurance with COVID coverage:

Berkshire Hathaway Travel Protection

What makes Berkshire Hathaway Travel Protection great:

Several plans allow policyholders to cancel for COVID-19 sickness as part of trip cancellation and trip interruption insurance benefits.

Several plans include COVID-19 medical coverage benefits.

Medical evacuation benefits are included in these plans.

Plans include limited sports and activities coverage and sports equipment loss benefits.

Basic Berkshire Hathaway Travel Protection will run you $50 for an ExactCare Value policy, the company’s most basic COVID-19 travel insurance coverage option.

Read our review

IMG

What makes IMG great:

Many plans include COVID-19 cancellation benefits.

Most of these plans also include COVID-19 medical benefits (the Travel Essentials plan doesn’t include this).

Medical evacuation coverage is available on select plans.

Coverage for adventure travel is available for an extra cost.

IMG is a good option for the budget-minded: Its Travel Essential plans cost more than $10 less than average based on our comparison.

Read our review

John Hancock Insurance Agency, Inc.

What makes John Hancock Insurance Agency great:

Multiple plans offer COVID-19 cancellation benefits as part of the included trip interruption and trip cancellation coverage.

These plans offer COVID-19 medical benefits.

Medical evacuation coverage is included in all COVID-19 coverage plans.

The John Hancock Insurance Agency, Inc. basic plan (Bronze) costs $56.

Read our review

Seven Corners

What makes Seven Corners great:

Multiple plans offer COVID-19 cancellation benefits as part of the included trip interruption and trip cancelation coverage.

These plans include COVID-19 medical benefits and evacuation and repatriation benefits.

There is no medical deductible.

Seven Corners’ basic coverage plan (RoundTrip Basic) for our trip to Croatia costs $44.

Read our review

Travelex Insurance Services

What makes Travelex Insurance Services great:

Multiple plans include Covid-19 sickness coverage, which reimburses prepaid and nonrefundable trip payments if a trip is canceled or interrupted due to a traveler contracting the virus.

These plans also include COVID-19 medical benefits.

Medical evacuation and repatriation benefits are included.

Basic coverage (Travel Basic) from Travelex Insurance Services costs $44 for our sample trip, which is slightly cheaper than average.

Read our review

Travel Insured International

What makes Travel Insured International great:

Multiple plans cover COVID-19 cancellation benefits as part of the included trip interruption and trip cancelation coverage.

These plans also include COVID-19 medical benefits, including medical evacuation.

Limited sports and activities coverage is included in plans with COVID-19 coverage.

Travel Insured International's basic coverage (Worldwide Trip Protector Edge) begins at $55 — only a few dollars more than the average basic policy price.

read our review

Tin Leg

What makes Tin Leg great:

A wide range of plans offer COVID-19 cancellation benefits as part of the included trip interruption and trip cancelation coverage.

All of these plans also include COVID-19 medical benefits.

All of these include medical evacuation benefits.

An adventure travel policy is available.

Another plus: Tin Leg’s basic coverage plan (Basic) for our trip to Croatia costs $48.85 — making it right around the average price for the policies we covered.

read our review

WorldTrips

What makes WorldTrips great:

Several plans allow policyholders to cancel for COVID-19 sickness as part of trip cancellation and trip interruption insurance benefits.

Several plans include medical coverage for COVID-19.

Medical evacuation and repatriation benefits are included.

Sports and activities and sports equipment loss are included.

Coverage can be extended for up to thirty days, including for medical quarantine purposes.

WorldTrips’ most affordable plan with COVID-19 coverage (Atlas Journey Economy) starts at $44, making it a low-cost option.

Additional resources for COVID-19 travel insurance shoppers

Do you want to learn more about travel insurance before you spend money on a policy? Take a look at these resources:

What is travel insurance?

What does travel insurance cover?

The best travel insurance companies

How to find the right travel insurance for you

10 credit cards that provide travel insurance