How much does IVF cost in Australia?

How much does IVF cost?

IVF will set you back between $10,000 and $13,000 per cycle of treatment, before Medicare rebates or private health insurance benefits. If you're eligible for Medicare and have private health insruance, your out of pockets should be closer to $6,000 per cycle.

There are lots of variables to this, however. Any or all of the following could impact the price, for good or ill:

• How many cycles you need: It's not uncommon to need 5 or more cycles of IVF to achieve a live birth.
• Medicare Safety Net: After paying a certain amount out of pocket, your benefit increases a little.
• Your personal needs: Treatment will be different for each person, as will the cost.

Once you get a GP referral to a private IVF clinic, you'll have an inital consultation. At this point you should be able to start getting more detail on the likely costs, based on your personal situation.

Extra costs of IVF

The table below has a breakdown of the costs of IVF. The numbers are typical, sourced from a range of leading Australian IVF clinics as of January 2025. Each clinic sill structure their fees differently, so your final bill may combine or break out some of these fees.

The final price of IVF

In the real world, people pay anywhere from $10,000 to over $100,000 to have a baby through IVF.

This is because you'll be paying out of pocket fees of $6,000 or more for every cycle, plus the extra fees we mentioned. With most people needing multiple cycles, you can easily rack up tens of thousands of dollars in bills.

The price of bulk billed IVF

Bulked billed IVF does exist, but it doesn't guarantee zero out-of--pocket costs. Many of the treatments for IVF and ICSI are covered my Medicare, with bulk billing clinics charging the MBS rate for those services. A few of the larger clinics that bulk bill include Adora, Connect IVF and The Fertility Centre.

The out-of-pocket costs you're most likely to pay are those associated with hospital day admissions and anaesthetist fees, which aren't covered by Medicare. Most commonly this will be for egg retrieval. The cost of this is typically $2,000 to $3,000 per visit.

If you have private health insurance that covers assisted reproductive services, your health fund should pay most of this. The typical out of pocket cost with insurance is around $220, according to Medical Cost Finder.

Problems with bulk billed IVF

While there are no real downsides of bulk billed IVF clinics, they down suit everyone. Bulk billed clinics can only support a limited range of infertility issues. They also tend to only serve people in heterosexual relationships. If your infertility is caused by something more complex than what a bulk billed clinic can offer, you'll likely need to move on to a private clinic.

There also tend to be long wait lists for bulk billed clinics, as they are quite popular. This might not be a problem if you're still quite young, but older couple may need to act sooner than a bulk billed IVF clinic can support.

That all said, if you're able to wait and don't know what is causing your infertility, then bulk billing clinics might be a first stop on your IVF journey. If they're not successful, you can always move on to a private clinic afterwards.

Childbirth in the public vs private system

Medicare rebates for IVF

Medicare will pay for a decent chunk of your IVF treatment. You'll need to have an initial GP referral first. There are dozens of MBS item numbers related to assisted reproductive technology services, and the combination of them you'll need will change, maybe even between each cycle of treatment. Your IVF clinic can advise you on which items Medicare will be kicking back for.

But long story short, Medicare can cover thousands of dollars of your treatment, but there will still be thousands to pay out of pocket. Importantly, Medicare won't cover any day admissions to hospital you'll need, or the cost of anaesthetic. That particular cost can be covered by private hospital insurance.

Health insurance for IVF

Gold tier hospital policies can help towards the overall cost of IVF, with some conditions. Private hospital insurance only covers services where you're admitted as a hospital in-patient.

Generally, the main surgical procedure in an IVF cycle is the egg collection, or oocyte pick-up. The cost of this service averages around $2,000 in total, with private patients paying an average of $220, according to Medical Cost Finder. Your policy will need to cover assisted reproductive services, which gold policies do.

How successful is IVF?

IVF is not a silver bullet, despite what IVf clinic marketing managers want you to think. In fact, the stats can be pretty disheartening at times. Here are some of the numbers from a 2015 academic study of women in the UK:

• The live birth rate after one cycle was 29.5%. That was for all women, with a median age of 35.
• Around 65% of women had a live birth by their sixth cycle. After 6 cycles, this number didn't go up much.
• For women over 40, 12.3% had a live birth in one cycle, with 31.5% having one by their 6th cycle.

That leaves around 30% of people, even after 6 to 9 rounds of expensive treatment, without a live birth, even more for older women. That's going to be emotionally and financially tough for anyone. If you are considering IVF, it's important to understand what you might be signing up for.

Frequently asked questions

• How much does IVF cost in Australia

  IVF treatment costs vary, but are around $10,000 to $13,000 per cycle before any rebates. If you have Medicare and private health insurance, your own of pockets costs should be closer to $6,000 per cycle. Remember you'll probably need multiple rounds of treatment, so the costs could start to add up.

• How does Medicare cover IVF?

  There are over 20 Medicare item numbers related to assisted reproductive treatment like IVF, but which ones will be relevant to you will change. For a typical IVF treatment cycle, Medicare will contribute a few thousand dollars to the cost.

Written by

Tim Bennett

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Tim Bennett is a Finder insurance & utilities expert. For over 10 years he's reported on news, politics, finance and other topics as a journalist and radio presenter. Tim's roles have included radio news reader and breakfast at the ABC, news producer for SBS and producer for Fairfax Media. Tim regularly appears as a health insurance expert on programs like Sunrise and SBS news, as well as in the Australian, The Daily Telegraph, The Courier Mail and more. See full bio

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