Obamacare sign-ups drop, but the extent won’t be clear for months
(CBS) — More Americans than expected enrolled in Affordable Care Act health insurance plans for this year, after premium subsidies were dramatically cut — but it remains to be seen whether they’ll keep the coverage as their costs mount.
It’s all part of a drama that roiled the ACA’s 2026 open enrollment period. Congressional debate over whether to extend more generous subsidies made available under the Biden administration led to the longest-ever government shutdown and focused public attention on rising health care costs and the affordability issue.
The enhanced subsidies, which expanded eligibility both by lowering the percentage of household income people had to pay toward their care and removing an income cap, expired at the end of last year. As a result, just about everyone buying ACA coverage saw their costs increase. For some, what they paid toward premiums doubled or more, even though less generous subsidies remain in place.
Many experts expected ACA enrollment, which hit a record 24 million in 2025, to fall this time around.
“If you raise the price of something a whole lot, economics tell us that a lot of people will buy less of it or not buy at all,” said Katherine Hempstead, a senior policy officer with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
Here are things to watch now:
Initial numbers aren’t final
The Congressional Budget Office told lawmakers in December 2024 that not extending the enhanced subsidies would cause 2.2 million people to lose insurance in 2026, with further increases in following years. Analysts with the Wakely Consulting Group also estimated that millions would opt out of insurance for this year.
Data released Jan. 28 by federal officials showed a year-over-year drop of about 1.2 million enrollments across the federal healthcare.gov marketplace and those run by states. Overall, there were 23 million enrollees, including 3.4 million new to ACA coverage.
At about the same time last year, there were 24.2 million sign-ups, with 3.9 million new to the marketplaces.
But there’s more to it than those initial numbers.
For one thing, both years’ data was pegged to Jan. 15 for the federal marketplace, which closed its open enrollment period that day. But, the data for the states that run their own marketplaces included sign-ups in most cases only through Jan. 10 or 11, even though some held open enrollment until the end of the month. Thus, the numbers don’t reflect what might have happened in those last days. Was there a surge in state sign-ups? Or, conversely, did the marketplaces see more enrollees cancel their coverage?
Additionally, those initial numbers are a mix of newly minted ACA enrollees and existing customers, many of whom were auto-reenrolled for 2026 — which raises other issues.
For existing, reenrolled policyholders, the real figures won’t be known for weeks or months, when it becomes clear how many actually pay their premiums. Some consumers may not have focused on their reenrollment costs or may have hoped Congress would extend the subsidies.
That’s an important factor to keep in mind because the CBO and Wakely estimates of millions losing insurance were based on projections for full-year coverage, not initial sign-ups.
In the coming weeks, “consumers may find they really can’t afford the premiums and cancel their plans, while carriers may also cancel coverage for nonpayment,” said Pat Kelly, executive director of Your Health Idaho, a state-based ACA marketplace, during a Jan. 22 call with reporters.
Sharp differences in state enrollment patterns
Changes are also afoot in the 19 other states (and the District of Columbia) that run their own exchanges, some of which have issued more detailed data about enrollment than the federal marketplace.
Most states saw lower enrollment for 2026 than the prior year, with the biggest drop in North Carolina, where sign-ups fell by nearly 22%, federal data shows.
In a few states — including New Mexico, Texas, California, and Maryland, as well as the District of Columbia — the number of people selecting ACA plans increased.
The jump was largest in New Mexico, with its initial number of people selecting plans up by nearly 14%. Increases were in the single digits in the other states and Washington, D.C.
New Mexico — uniquely — used its own tax dollars to fully offset the loss of the more generous federal tax subsidies for all consumers. A few other states, including California, Colorado, Maryland, and Washington, used state money to help some enrollees.
The State Marketplace Network, a collective of 22 state marketplaces supported by the National Academy for State Health Policy, said initial enrollment figures raise concern. Compared with the same time last year, outright plan cancellations are up 83% in Colorado, disenrollments are four times what they were in Idaho, and Virginia has seen cancellations double.
New enrollments are down 32% in California from the same period last year, according to data from the state. In Pennsylvania, people ages 55 to 64, the group with the highest premiums, and young people 26 to 34 are terminating their coverage in higher numbers than other age groups, state data shows.
“We have drastically higher rates of people dropping their coverage,” said Devon Trolley, executive director of the Pennsylvania Health Insurance Exchange Authority. “We had 70,000 drop in the last two months, from early retirees to small-business owners to farmers not knowing how to make ends meet.”
On Feb. 9, Pennsylvania released final numbers, showing enrollment dropped by about 2% from last year, although that figure masks some of the effects. The state says nearly 18% of enrollees dropped coverage altogether, with older and rural residents being the most likely to fall out.
Some Republicans credited Trump-administration-backed anti-fraud measures, which included a range of regulatory and legislative changes, for tightening the system. Although some of those actions were paused by a federal court and have not taken effect, those ACA critics, some of whom have produced controversial estimates that millions may have been improperly enrolled, say that’s behind the decline. They have previously blamed the more generous subsidies for unauthorized enrollments or ACA plan-switching by commission-seeking brokers.
States that run their own ACA marketplaces, however, reported little or no such unauthorized switching. Relative to the federal marketplace, the state-based ACA platforms employ additional safeguards to prevent brokers from accessing consumers’ coverage without authorization.
Among consumers not returning to the marketplace, the main reason is cost, said Mila Kofman, executive director of the DC Health Benefit Exchange Authority, which runs the district’s ACA marketplace.
“When we looked at who these folks are, half are small-business owners,” Kofman said. “They are not folks committing fraud.”
Lower premiums, higher deductibles
Rather than sticking with automatic reenrollment, existing customers in many states shifted sharply into lower-priced “bronze” plans that come with higher deductibles than silver, gold, and platinum plans.
California saw 73% of renewing members who switched plans move to a bronze plan, up from 27% at the same time last year, the State Marketplace Network reported. In Maine, bronze enrollment now represents almost 60% of all plans purchased.
People are “looking at what works in their monthly budget, looking for that lower premium,” said Stacey Pogue, a senior research fellow at the Center on Health Insurance Reforms at Georgetown University. “Some might be crossing their fingers that they won’t need to meet their deductible.”
On average, bronze plans have an annual deductible of $7,500. All ACA plans are required to cover certain preventive services — such as some vaccinations, cancer screenings, and other tests — without a copayment or deductible, but most everything else is covered only after an annual deductible is met.
High deductibles can lead some patients to avoid seeking medical care, Hempstead said.
“People are terrified to use their care,” she said. “They may delay something until it’s more serious.”
She added that medical providers, including hospitals and doctors, are bracing for an increase in the number of insured patients who can’t afford to pay their deductibles.
“Everyone is anticipating that hospitals will have to give out more charity care, which will hurt their bottom lines and might lead them to have to lay off people or close or reduce services,” she said.
