Pricing hub

Scope and definitions

This hub covers cash-pay compounded semaglutide and compounded tirzepatide programs from U.S. telehealth providers. Four terms do the work everywhere below. Advertised price: what the provider displays before checkout. Effective monthly cost: total mandatory cost ÷ months supplied — the comparable number. First-month cost: everything due before or during month one, which on prepaid plans is the entire term price. Renewal cost: the recurring price after introductory pricing ends, unverified for most providers and therefore rarely shown yet.

Three separations are never crossed in a single ranking: semaglutide vs tirzepatide (different medications, different price floors), injections vs ODT/sublingual (different formulations with different evidence), and standard-dose vs microdose (different products, not a discount tier). Brand-name products and manufacturer cash-pay channels are a fourth, separate class — see brand vs compounded cost.

The four price categories

Advertised headline vs true monthly cost

compounded semaglutide compounded tirzepatide

View chart data as a table

Where headline price and true all-in cost diverge

Provider	Semaglutide	Tirzepatide
Mochi Health	$99.00	$178.00
Ivím Health	$124.75	$199.75
NexLife	$145.00	$145.00
Henry Meds	$297.00	$297.00

The two-series chart contrasts each provider's advertised medication headline (blue) against its effective monthly cost once mandatory memberships and fees are included (green). Where the bars match (NexLife, Henry Meds), the headline is close to the true cost; where the green bar is longer (Mochi at $99+$79 membership, Ivím at $124.75+$75 membership), a low headline sits atop a required fee. All figures provider-reported or calculated, 2026-07-20; see the Mochi profile for membership detail.

Key findings at a glance

From the 2026-07-20 capture: the lowest captured advertised effective monthly for standard semaglutide injections is $133 (GobyMeds, third-party-reviewed as matching checkout); the lowest for standard tirzepatide is $186.00 (NexLife, provider-reported, 12-month prepaid equivalent); membership fees where present add 40–80% to headline medication prices; prepayment discounts cluster at 10–15%; and no program is checkout-verified by us, which is why every finding on this hub is qualified rather than crowned.

What the captured data shows

Three patterns hold across the 35-program capture. First, the advertised floor and the true floor diverge most at membership-model providers: sub-$100 medication headlines routinely become $170–$250 all-in once required memberships are added, while bundled providers' higher headlines are closer to complete. Second, prepayment buys roughly 10–15% off month-to-month rates across the market — a real discount that is really a loan to the provider, priced against unverified refund terms. Third, the cheapest advertised tier (sub-$100 effective) is where verification matters most: covered dose ranges, pharmacy identity, and renewal pricing are exactly the fields that narrow such offers, which is why advertised leadership is published only with those qualifications attached.

Price-range analysis

For standard-dose semaglutide injections, captured advertised effective monthlies span $133 to roughly $344 — a 2.6× spread for nominally the same medication class. The lower band (GobyMeds at $133 on a 3-month bundle, $169 monthly) is third-party-reviewed; the $145–$200 band holds the bundled all-inclusive providers (NexLife, Fridays, Join Josie, Henry Meds); above $250 sit membership-and-coaching models where the program, not the molecule, is the product. Tirzepatide repeats the shape shifted upward: captured effective lows around $186 (NexLife) and month-to-month rates of $233–$299. The spread itself is the finding — in this market, which pricing structure you buy matters more than which logo you buy it from.

Hidden and mandatory fees

Five fee types separate headlines from true costs across the capture. Memberships are the largest: $69–$149/month where reported, often exceeding half the medication price itself. Consultation and onboarding fees are one-time but front-loaded, inflating first-month cost precisely where intro discounts advertise the opposite. Laboratory fees appear both as requirements and as unpriced "may be required" clauses — the latter recorded as unverified, not zero. Shipping ranges from free to $10–$25 per shipment. Dose surcharges are the quietest: dose-tiered pricing can add $50–$100/month by maintenance dose, which is why every table here prices flat-dose claims as a named feature and tiered pricing at the maintenance dose, never the starter.

Introductory vs renewal pricing

A starter offer is not renewal pricing, and the capture treats them as different fields. Several providers advertise first-month or first-term discounts whose subsequent price is disclosed vaguely or not at all; where renewal pricing is unknown, we publish the introductory figure labeled introductory and exclude the program from any long-term-cost conclusion rather than extrapolating. The renewal field is among the least documented in the market — a gap that itself tells you where to press any provider before committing: ask for month-13 pricing in writing.

Consumer decision guidance

Work the sequence in order. First, normalize: run every candidate through the true-cost calculator at your expected maintenance dose, with memberships and fees included. Second, bound the commitment: amount due today, refund terms in writing, beyond-use-date coverage on advance shipments. Third, verify the pharmacy filling your specific order — four steps, before payment. Fourth, get renewal pricing, not starter pricing. Fifth, price the FDA-approved alternatives you may have access to (insurance, manufacturer cash-pay) as a separate column, remembering they carry premarket-reviewed manufacturing no compounded product has. Then decide with your prescriber — the medication choice itself was never a pricing question.

Methodology summary

Every figure derives from a ledger record with source and capture date. Mandatory costs count; coupons, referral credits, FSA/HSA effects, and financing don't. Monthly equivalents are computed to the cent and labeled prepaid where applicable. Conflicting sources suppress a field rather than average it. Advertised-price ("cheapest") findings may publish with full qualification; verified all-inclusive ("most affordable") rankings require three checkout-verified programs per category, currently met by none. The full rulebook is on the methodology page.

Limitations

As of 2026-07-20, no program is checkout-verified; figures are provider-reported page pricing or secondary-source estimates, several of which conflict. Renewal pricing is largely unknown and excluded rather than guessed. State availability, dose-range coverage, and per-order pharmacy identity remain uncaptured for most providers. Prices change between our capture and your checkout — the checkout price is always authoritative.

Turn any advertised price into a comparable number

Frequently asked questions

Why don't you just name the cheapest provider?

We name the lowest captured advertised figures with their statuses — currently GobyMeds at $133/month effective for standard semaglutide injections (third-party-reviewed) and NexLife at $186 for standard tirzepatide (provider-reported) — because that's what the evidence supports. A "cheapest" crown implies the number survives checkout, includes all mandatory fees, covers real dose ranges, and persists at renewal; we have not independently checkout-verified any program, so the qualified finding is the honest ceiling.

Why is tirzepatide more expensive than semaglutide?

Across the capture, tirzepatide programs price roughly $40–$100/month above semaglutide at the same provider. Ingredient cost and market positioning both contribute; we don't publish a causal claim. What matters for comparison is that the two are different medications with different evidence and different floors — which is why no table on this site ranks them together.

Are prepaid plans worth it?

Arithmetically they save about 10–15% versus month-to-month across the market. Practically, the discount is priced against risk: the full term is due today, refund terms are mostly unverified, and beyond-use dates must actually cover advance shipments. Run the commitment calculator, get refund terms in writing, and treat prepaid dollars as at-risk until a provider's terms prove otherwise.

What's the difference between "cheapest" and "most affordable" here?

Deliberate vocabulary. "Cheapest" pages analyze advertised or upfront price — useful for shopping, publishable with qualification from captured data. "Most affordable" pages analyze verified, normalized, all-inclusive cost — publishable only from checkout-verified evidence, which no category has yet. Conflating the two is how a $99 headline beats a $145 true price; keeping them separate is the point of the site.

Why do sources disagree about the same provider's price?

Because they capture different things at different times: intro vs renewal rates, medication-only vs bundled prices, different doses, or stale pages. When reputable sources conflict — as they did for Mochi's membership (since resolved to its current $79 first-party value) and still do for Henry Meds ($119 vs $179 vs $199–$297) — we store the conflict, suppress the field from rankings, and queue first-party capture rather than picking the friendliest number.

Do these prices include everything?

Effective monthly cost includes every disclosed mandatory charge. Where a fee is unknown, we say unverified — never zero — and flag it, because unknown shipping is not free shipping and an unknown membership is not no membership. The one number that always wins is the checkout total, which is why checkout capture is the verification backlog's first item.