Record high of 1.9 million residents enroll in Covered California for 2025 health coverage, wildfire victims may sign up until March 8

SAN FRANCISCO — A record number of 1.9 million residents have enrolled in Covered California for 2025 health coverage as of January 26, 2025, including nearly 300,000 Californians who have signed up for new health insurance plans.

The annual open enrollment for Covered California ended on January 31, 2025 for health coverage in 2025. A special enrollment will be open until February 28 that would make the health plan effective from March 1.

For the wildfire victims residing in Los Angeles and Ventura counties, Covered California provides a special enrollment deadline which is extended to March 8 and allows those residents to sign up for health coverage for an additional 60 days from the date the state of emergency was declared.

According to the latest data released by Covered California, over 1.9 million enrollees are covered by health plans via Covered California for 2025 coverage. It is a record high number since Covered California was launched in 2014 as a state-based health insurance marketplace for eligible Californians to purchase health insurance with governmental subsidies under the financial assistance programs.

The annual open enrollment period for 2025 coverage began on November 1, 2024 and ended on January 31, 2025. As of January 26, 299,060 Californians were new enrollees and have signed up for 2025 coverage, a 13 percent increase over the same period for the past year.

While nearly 300,000 Californians signed up during the open enrollment period, another 1,638,954 Californians have renewed their health insurance plans, a 10 percent jump over the same date for 2024, with more than 100,000 total enrollees in 2025 as compared to the record enrollment in 2024.

“Uninsured Californians are taking advantage of the unprecedented financial help available to help pay for coverage in 2025, as we have seen robust sign-ups throughout the state and reached our all-time record sign-ups before the end of open enrollment,” said Covered California Executive Director Jessica Altman.

Among the new enrollees, nearly half of them came from five Southern California counties, Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura, with a total of nearly 150,000.

Also among the 300,000 new enrollees, nearly 82,000 enrollees identified as Latinos, over 52,000 identified as Asian Americans, over 72,000 White, over 9,000 Blacks, and over 58,000 Californians did not disclose their race or ethnicity.

Despite the continued progress, Covered California said it was estimated by the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research that there were still nearly 1.3 million uninsured Californians who either qualified for subsidies through Covered California (591,000) or were eligible for Medi-Cal coverage (675,000), and they reside all over the state.

Covered California has offered more financial help for Californians for the 2025 coverage than ever before. Building on the existing federal subsidies to help pay for health insurance premiums, Covered California enhanced its cost-sharing reduction program to reduce the cost for consumers by lowering health insurance premiums, Covered California enhanced its cost-sharing reduction program to reduce the cost for consumers by lowering out-of-pocket costs, including eliminating deductibles in all three Silver cost-sharing reduction plans.

Nearly 90 percent of Covered California’s enrollees have received financial help for the 2025 coverage, according to Covered California. Two-thirds of those enrollees were eligible for health insurance for $10 or less per month, and nearly half could get a comprehensive Silver plan for that price.