Porting Health Insurance in India: 2026 Rules & Process

What is health insurance porting?

Porting is the process of moving your health insurance policy from one insurer to another at renewal, while carrying forward the continuity benefits you have already earned – waiting-period credit, moratorium years and accrued no-claim bonus. It is a policyholder right protected by IRDAI, India's insurance regulator, and it exists so you are never held hostage by a bad insurer just because you have served three years of waiting periods with them.

The easiest way to think about it: porting your policy is like porting your mobile number. You keep the number (your continuity benefits) and only change the network (the insurer). If you have served 3 years of a pre-existing disease waiting period with Insurer A and port to Insurer B, those 3 years count at Insurer B too. You do not start from zero.

And porting is having a moment. Health insurance premiums in India have climbed sharply over the past few years – renewal notices with 20–30% hikes are no longer rare – and search interest in "porting health insurance" has risen with them. A ₹18,000 premium quietly becoming ₹26,000 at renewal is exactly the kind of jolt that makes people look at the door. The good news: the door exists, and IRDAI has built rules around it. The caution: walking through it carelessly can cost you more than the premium hike ever would.

Who can port? Under IRDAI's regulations, all indemnity-based health insurance policies – individual and family floater plans from general and standalone health insurers – are eligible for portability. Personal accident and travel policies are excluded. You can even port from a group (employer) policy to an individual policy, though that route involves full underwriting.

How does porting work, step by step?

Porting runs on a clock. You can only port at renewal – not mid-year, not during the grace period – and IRDAI's guidelines expect you to apply well before your policy expires: 45–60 days early is the safe standard, and the window generally closes about 30 days before renewal. Some insurers informally accept requests even two weeks out, but that leaves no buffer if underwriting drags, so treat 45 days as your working deadline.

Here is the full timeline, including the deadlines IRDAI puts on each insurer:

Timelines as per IRDAI's portability guidelines and the Master Circular on Protection of Policyholders' Interests, 2024. End to end, a smooth port typically takes two to three weeks.

The document set the new insurer will ask for: your current policy document and latest renewal notice, the last 2–3 years' policy documents, any endorsement letters (members added, cover increased), your claim history if you have claimed, recent medical reports, ID and address proof (Aadhaar, PAN), and the filled proposal and portability forms. Depending on your age, sum insured and health history, the insurer may also ask for medical tests.

A few rules of the road that save people real grief:

What carries over when you port – and what doesn't?

The heart of porting is waiting-period credit: the time you have already served under your old policy counts toward the waiting periods of the new one. Under IRDAI's current rules, pre-existing disease and specific illness waiting periods are capped at 3 years, and the moratorium period – after which an insurer cannot reject claims for non-disclosure – is 5 years of continuous cover. Both clocks carry over when you port. If you have served 3 years of your moratorium with Insurer A, Insurer B must count from year 3, not year zero.

Your accrued no-claim bonus is recognised too: continuity credit applies up to your old base sum insured plus the eligible bonus you have earned. So a ₹10 lakh policy that has grown to ₹15 lakh with bonus can carry waiting-period credit on the full ₹15 lakh, subject to the new insurer's product rules.

Now the part people miss. Three things do not carry over:

The enhanced sum insured. If you port your ₹10 lakh policy and take ₹25 lakh of cover with the new insurer, the extra ₹15 lakh is fresh cover with fresh waiting periods. A diabetic who ports and doubles their cover is fully protected on the old amount, but the new slice behaves like a brand-new policy for 3 years.

Your old premium. The new insurer prices its own product and underwrites your current health, not the health you had when you first bought cover. Loadings, co-pays or exclusions can appear on the new policy even if your old one had none.

Your relationship. Years of goodwill, smooth claims and a known service team stay behind. You carry forward the waiting-period clock – nothing else. This is why we say porting transfers your credit, not your history.

Get your port checked before you commit

A NYVO advisor will compare your current policy against the plan you want to port to – waiting-period credit, exclusions, real premium after underwriting – and tell you honestly if staying put is the smarter move.

When does porting get rejected?

Here is the honest part most porting guides skip: portability is IRDAI-mandated, but acceptance is not. The new insurer underwrites you exactly as it would a new customer, and it can accept your application as-is, accept it with conditions – premium loading, exclusions, co-pays, mandatory add-ons – or reject it outright. From the insurer's side, a porting customer is an awkward proposition: they never collected your earlier premiums, but they may have to pay claims immediately since your waiting periods are already served. Many insurers therefore apply stricter underwriting to ported cases than to fresh ones.

In practice, port requests most commonly fail for these reasons:

If you are rejected, nothing is lost – provided your old policy is still alive. Renew it, keep your credits ticking, ask the new insurer for the underwriting reason in writing, and revisit porting at the next renewal, possibly with a different insurer. This is precisely why the golden rule exists: the old policy stays active until the new one is issued.

Porting vs migration: which switch do you actually need?

"Switching" your health insurance can mean two different things, and picking the wrong one is a common mistake. Porting moves your policy to a different insurer. Migration moves you to a different plan within the same insurer. Both are IRDAI-regulated, both preserve waiting-period credit, and neither carries a switching fee – but the effort and risk involved are very different.

Both routes are free of switching charges under IRDAI's portability and migration guidelines.

The decision rule is one question: is your problem with the insurer, or with the plan? Repeated claim rejections, a weak hospital network in your city, or pricing far above the market – that is an insurer problem, and porting fixes it. Outdated features, a room-rent cap, a sum insured that no longer matches hospital bills – that is a plan problem, and migrating to a better plan with your existing insurer is usually faster, safer and needs less paperwork. Try migration first when the insurer itself has treated you well.

Should you port, or just buy a fresh policy?

Porting wins whenever your waiting-period credit is worth protecting. If you have served two or more years of waiting periods, or you have any pre-existing condition on record, that credit is the most valuable thing you own in health insurance – buying fresh means restarting a 3-year PED clock and a 5-year moratorium from zero. For anyone over 35 or with a documented health history, porting is almost always the better route to a new insurer.

Buying fresh makes sense in narrower cases: you are young and healthy with no meaningful waiting periods served, your old policy has already lapsed (which kills portability anyway), or you want a policy structure so different that continuity credit barely matters. A healthy 27-year-old one year into their first policy loses little by simply buying the plan they actually want.

And sometimes the right answer is to do nothing. If you are past the 5-year moratorium with a decent insurer, you hold a claims position that no new policy – ported or fresh – can immediately replicate. Do not trade that for a marginally lower premium or a shinier brochure. Port for genuine problems: systemic claim failures, a hospital network that does not exist where you live, or premium hikes far beyond what the market charges for equivalent cover. Do not port for a ₹1,500 saving.

FAQs

Can I port my health insurance policy any time during the year?

No. IRDAI allows porting only at renewal, never mid-term. You should apply to the new insurer 45–60 days before your policy expires; the window generally closes about 30 days before renewal. If you miss it, renew your existing policy and port at the next renewal instead.

Is there a fee for porting health insurance?

No. Under IRDAI's portability guidelines, insurers cannot charge you a separate fee for porting. Your premium itself can still change, because the new insurer prices its own plan and underwrites your risk afresh, but there is no switching charge.

What happens if my porting request is rejected?

Your existing policy stays intact. Simply renew it with your current insurer so there is no break in coverage – all your waiting-period credit and moratorium years continue. You can ask the new insurer for the underwriting reason, fix what you can, and try porting again at a future renewal.

Does my no-claim bonus transfer when I port?

Your accrued no-claim bonus is recognised as part of your continuity credit – waiting-period credit applies up to your old base sum insured plus the eligible bonus. But how the new insurer applies that credit depends on its own product rules, so always confirm the exact figure in the new policy schedule before you pay.

Can I increase my sum insured while porting?

Yes, you can request a higher sum insured, but the new insurer's underwriting decides whether you get it. Continuity benefits apply only up to your old sum insured plus eligible bonus; the additional cover is treated as fresh and carries fresh waiting periods.

How long does health insurance porting take?

Typically two to three weeks end to end. Under IRDAI's timelines, your old insurer must share your policy and claim history through the Insurance Information Bureau portal within 7 working days, and the new insurer must convey its underwriting decision within 15 days of receiving your complete documents. Applying 45–60 days early keeps you safely inside these timelines.