The State of US IVF in 2026: What the CDC Data on 457 Clinics Shows

An original analysis of the CDC's national ART data covering every reporting US fertility clinic, and what the numbers mean if you are deciding where to go.

Across the 457 US fertility clinics in the CDC's most recent national Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) data, a patient's chance of a live birth from IVF varies far more by clinic than most people expect. For patients under 35 using their own eggs, the live-birth rate per egg retrieval ranges from near zero at the smallest clinics to 79.5% at the highest, with the middle half of clinics falling between 35.6% and 54.5% and a typical (median) clinic at 46.6%. At the same age, in other words, the clinic you choose can change your odds by a factor of two or more. This report is our analysis of what the national data actually shows in 2026, built from the CDC ART National Summary, and it is the evidence behind why IVFcost.co compares clinics the way it does.

Key findings

• IVF success varies enormously between clinics at the same age. For under-35 patients, the middle half of clinics report a live-birth rate per retrieval between 35.6% and 54.5%, and the full range runs from near 0% to 79.5%. Age is decisive, but clinic choice is the second axis almost no one is shown.
• The age curve is steep and consistent. The typical clinic's live-birth rate per retrieval falls from 46.6% under 35 to 32.1% at 35 to 37, 20.0% at 38 to 40, and 5.5% over 40 (medians across clinics). The CDC's national, cycle-weighted averages are higher (49.7%, 36.3%, 23.1%, and 7.7%), because large, high-volume clinics carry more weight in the national figure than in a clinic-by-clinic median.
• Fertility care is geographically concentrated. Just five states hold 220 of the 457 clinics (48%), and California alone has 85 (about one in five). At the other end, nine states have a single reporting clinic and more than a dozen have two or fewer, so where you live can decide whether choosing a clinic is even an option.
• Price is still a black box. The vast majority of these clinics publish no standard cycle price at all, quoting only after a consultation, which is why an honest cost estimate has to be built from components rather than read off a menu.
• A clinic's number has to be read with its cycle volume. About 15% of clinics reported a 0% under-35 rate, which almost always reflects very few cycles in that band rather than a clinic where IVF never works. Small samples are noisy, and reading a rate without its denominator is the most common way patients are misled.

Success varies more by clinic than by almost anything else

The single most important thing the national data shows is not the headline success rate. It is the spread. Fertility marketing trains patients to think of IVF success as one number that mostly depends on age, and age genuinely is the dominant factor. But hold age constant and the clinic-to-clinic variation is still large enough to change a family's entire plan.

Consider under-35 patients using their own eggs, the group with the best and most stable odds. Across reporting clinics, the live-birth rate per egg retrieval has a median of 46.6%, but the middle half of clinics span 35.6% to 54.5%, and the extremes run from near zero to 79.5%. The difference between a clinic at the 25th percentile and one at the 75th is roughly 19 percentage points for the same patient at the same age. Further down the age curve the proportional gap widens: for 38-to-40 patients, the middle half runs from just 6.7% to 26.1%, so a top-quartile clinic reports close to four times the live-birth rate of a bottom-quartile one.

The clearest way to see the clinic gap is to place a bottom-quartile clinic next to a top-quartile clinic at each age. The chart below does exactly that: within every age band, the top-quarter clinic reports far better odds than the bottom-quarter clinic, and the gap is not a rounding difference. It is the difference between plans.

Here is the same picture as a table, which is the most useful single view a patient can carry into a decision. The "national average" column is the CDC's cycle-weighted figure (what happens across all cycles nationally); the "typical clinic" and "range" columns describe how individual clinics differ, which is the part that is yours to control.

Metric: live birth per intended egg retrieval, patients using their own eggs. National averages are the CDC's published national figures; distribution statistics are IVFcost.co's analysis across reporting clinics in the CDC 2022 ART data. You can filter any clinic by age band in our success-rate explorer.

Why the "typical clinic" is lower than the "national average"

A careful reader will notice that the median clinic (46.6% under 35) sits below the CDC's national average (49.7%). Both numbers are correct, and the gap is instructive. The national average is cycle-weighted: a large clinic performing thousands of retrievals counts far more toward it than a small clinic performing a few dozen. The median treats every clinic equally, so the many small clinics, which tend to report lower and noisier rates, pull it down. Neither is "the truth." The national average tells you what happens across the country's cycles; the median tells you what a randomly chosen clinic looks like. For a patient, the distribution matters more than either point estimate, because you do not attend the average clinic. You attend one specific clinic, and the range is the space of outcomes you are actually choosing among.

How to read a clinic's number without being misled

The spread above comes with an essential caveat, and it is the same one the CDC itself stresses: a rate is meaningless without its denominator. About 15% of clinics reported a 0% under-35 rate, and roughly 18% reported under 25%. Some of that is real, but most of the extreme low values reflect very small cycle counts, not clinics where IVF categorically fails. A clinic that performed six under-35 retrievals in a year and happened to have a hard run will post a jarring number that says almost nothing about your odds there. This is why every clinic figure on IVFcost.co is shown next to its reported cycle volume, and why a headline rate should never be read alone.

The practical rules that follow from the data:

1. Compare clinics at your own age band, not their best one. A clinic can honestly advertise a strong under-35 number while its 38-to-40 rate is unremarkable. The success-rate explorer and the clinic directory let you re-rank on the band that matches you.
2. Weight rates by cycle volume. A slightly lower rate on hundreds of cycles is more trustworthy than a spectacular rate on a handful.
3. A single number is a starting point, not a verdict. Diagnosis, protocol, and individual biology move outcomes as much as the clinic does. Use the data to build a shortlist, then ask each clinic hard questions.

The map is lopsided: where the clinics are, and are not

IVF access in the United States is strikingly concentrated. The five largest states by clinic count hold 220 of the 457 reporting clinics, or 48%, and California alone accounts for 85 clinics (about one in five in the country). That concentration follows population, but it outpaces it, and it has a direct consequence: in the most clinic-dense states, a patient can genuinely shop on success rate and price, while in much of the country the "choice" is one clinic or a long drive across a state line.

At the thin end of the distribution are the access deserts. Nine states have a single CDC-reporting fertility clinic (Alaska, Arkansas, Idaho, Maine, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Rhode Island, and South Dakota), and more than a dozen states have two or fewer. For a patient in one of them, the questions this report is built to answer, which clinic has the best odds at my age and what will it cost, partially collapse: there may be only one answer within reach. Geography, in other words, is a fertility variable in its own right, and it interacts with cost, because reaching a better or cheaper clinic can mean travel, lodging, and time off work on top of the cycle. We break the picture down state by state in the state fertility-clinic hubs, so a patient can see their real local options before assuming they have none.

The cost black box

If success rates are unevenly reported, prices are barely reported at all. Of the 457 clinics in the data, only a small handful publish a standard cycle price; the rest quote only after a consultation. This is not an accident of the data. It is how the industry prices, and it is why a patient cannot simply comparison-shop IVF the way they would a flight. The published "base fee" that does exist, typically $12,000 to $15,000, is also structurally misleading, because it covers the core clinical cycle and excludes medications, genetic testing, freezing, storage, and the frozen transfer that a modern cycle usually needs. The true all-in cost of one medicated cycle runs closer to $20,000 to $30,000, and because the average patient needs more than two cycles, the realistic budget is $40,000 to $60,000. We built the IVF cost calculator precisely because no clinic menu will give you that number, and the full reasoning is in our guide to what IVF actually costs.

What this means if you are choosing a clinic

The through-line of the data is a single, actionable idea: your odds are not fixed by your age alone; the clinic is a lever, and it is a lever most patients never see quantified. Two people of the same age, with similar diagnoses, can face materially different odds depending on where they go, and can pay wildly different amounts for the privilege, often without ever seeing a price in advance. That is the gap this reference exists to close.

Concretely, the data supports a simple process:

1. Start from your age band. Filter clinics on the metric that matches you in the success-rate explorer, not the number a clinic chooses to advertise.
2. Build a real budget before the first consult. Use the cost calculator to turn a base quote into an all-in, multi-cycle number so you are not blindsided halfway through.
3. Read every rate next to its cycle volume, and treat any extreme number on a small sample with skepticism.
4. Account for geography. If your state has one clinic, factor the real cost and feasibility of traveling to a better or cheaper one, and see your options in the clinic directory.

Methodology and limits

This analysis is built from the CDC's 2022 Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) National Summary and clinic-level data, the most recent complete surveillance year the CDC has published, covering the 457 reporting US fertility clinics IVFcost.co tracks across all 50 states and the District of Columbia. The headline metric throughout is live birth per intended egg retrieval for patients using their own eggs, chosen because it is reported consistently across clinics and age bands, which makes clinic-to-clinic comparison valid. Distribution statistics (median, quartiles, and range) are computed across clinics, giving each clinic equal weight; the CDC's national averages are cycle-weighted, which is why the two differ, as explained above. Rates on small cycle counts are inherently noisy, and a small number of clinics report zero in a band because they performed very few cycles there, not because the procedure never succeeds. Donor-egg cycles, which have markedly higher and flatter rates, are reported separately and are outside this analysis. Every figure traces to the CDC source; IVFcost.co adds the analysis, never the underlying numbers. The data is refreshed as the CDC publishes new years, and this report reflects the 2022 reporting year as of 2026. For how we handle sourcing and neutrality across the whole site, see our methodology.

This is an informational analysis, not medical advice. Individual outcomes depend on diagnosis, clinic, protocol, and circumstances a national dataset cannot capture. Confirm any clinic's current figures with the clinic and with a licensed clinician.