How every figure is sourced, dated, and computed
IVFcost.co exists to be trusted. Every success rate, price, and score on this site traces to a named public record, carries a confidence tier, and is stamped with when we retrieved it. This page is the full account of how that works, so you never have to take a number on faith.
What a confidence dot means
Every figure carries one of four tiers. The dot's color is the same on every surface, so a claim's KIND is always legible at a glance. Color is never used alone: a text label always accompanies it.
Direct from an authoritative public source (CDC ART, ClinicalTrials.gov, or NIH DSLD).
Published by the clinic or brand about its own service or product (a listed price, a service list).
From a reputable secondary source (a peer-reviewed journal or science-news report).
Derived by IVFcost.co from primary sources; shown with a leading ~.
Editorial as-of vs live retrieval
A health-data site fails the moment it presents a stale figure as current. We keep two clocks and never let one stand in for the other.
The curated, code-owned catalog (the well-known networks' editorial profiles, supplement identity, the source registry, this copy) is dated as of Aug 13, 2026. It changes only when the code is edited, and it is never shown next to a live number.
The national clinic directory (every CDC-reporting clinic's name, location, and live-birth rates) and every live figure record when we last retrieved them, and read as checked a certain time ago. Right now the board shows:
A verified figure whose feed has not refreshed within its cadence is visibly downgraded (its dot turns amber, then red) rather than shown as confidently live. A broken pipeline surfaces as stale, never as silence.
How each figure is built
Almost every figure is read straight from an authoritative record or a provider's own published page. The one place we compute rather than read is the IVF cost estimate, which sums only cited components, and we show exactly how.
Success rate
VerifiedClinic success rates come from the CDC ART (Assisted Reproductive Technology) national reporting, which US clinics are required by law to submit. We show the CDC's own live-birth rates by age band and link each figure to the record it came from. SART re-cuts the same US reporting interactively, so we take US clinic outcomes from CDC ART rather than duplicate them.
Source: CDC ART Success Rates (NASS)
Clinic and test cost
StatedConsumer fertility prices (an IVF or egg-freezing cycle, an at-home hormone or sperm test) are published by the provider about its own service, so they are Stated, not derived. We record the price exactly as the source states it and cite the exact page that proves it. There is no free real-time price API for this market, so this layer is code-cited and re-verified on a cadence, and every price carries its verification date.
Each price links to the clinic's or brand's own published pricing page. Where a clinic does not publish a price, we show an honest gap rather than an invented number, and base cycle prices are labeled as such because medications, testing, and add-ons are often billed separately.
Registered trials
VerifiedTrial counts are read directly from ClinicalTrials.gov (NLM). We show the number of registered fertility trials (IVF, egg freezing, embryo transfer, ovarian stimulation) and link each count to the search that returns it, so the number is never a claim you have to take on faith.
Source: ClinicalTrials.gov API v2
IVF cost estimate
ComputedThe cost calculator is the one place we compute a figure rather than read it, and it still shows its work: it sums only the cited national cost components you switch on (the base fee, medications, and the add-ons), so every dollar is traceable to a source. It never fabricates coverage, it subtracts only the benefit you enter, and the cumulative-odds figure is an explicitly simplified model, labeled as such, never a personal prediction.
Each cost component is cited to its own source inside the calculator.
The source registry
Every fact on the site names one of these sources. A Primary mark means the source is free, open, and updated at least daily: the drivers behind the live board.
Identity & governance
Voluntarily reported adverse events for prescription drugs, keyed by generic name, with the FDA serious-outcome subset.
U.S. Food & Drug Administration
The current FDA-approved prescribing information (indications, dosage, warnings, contraindications, boxed warnings) for a marketed drug product, linked to its DailyMed record.
U.S. Food & Drug Administration
Pricing & availability
The national average price US retail pharmacies pay to acquire a drug, per unit and per NDC, from a monthly CMS survey of invoice prices.
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services
Success rates, evidence & trials
Clinic-level US ART outcomes (live birth per intended retrieval or transfer) by age band and diagnosis, with cycle-count denominators, from mandated national reporting (Socrata SODA API on data.cdc.gov).
U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Clinic-level US ART services offered (donor egg, donated embryo, embryo/egg cryopreservation, gestational carrier), quality signals (verified lab accreditation, SART membership), and annual cycle and outcome volumes, from mandated national reporting (Socrata SODA API on data.cdc.gov).
U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Per-clinic US IVF outcome reports rendered interactively (no API, no bulk download). We do NOT ingest it: it is largely a re-cut of the same reporting CDC publishes openly, so US clinic outcomes come from CDC ART instead.
Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology
UK clinic-level births per embryo transferred or per egg collection by age band, extracted from clinic pages (no clinic bulk file or API); an optional UK benchmark layer for a US-focused build.
Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority
Aggregate national European ART data published annually in Human Reproduction; national context only, no clinic-level breakdown and no API.
European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology
Registered fertility trials (IVF, egg freezing, embryo transfer, ovarian stimulation) with total counts, outcomes, and the investigational pipeline.
U.S. National Library of Medicine
Reproductive-medicine literature: abstracts, open-access full text, hit counts, and Cochrane systematic reviews reachable via a journal filter.
EMBL-EBI
MeSH-indexed reproductive-medicine literature for evidence filtering (RCT, meta-analysis, systematic review) via E-utilities counts.
U.S. National Library of Medicine
Supplements & chemistry
Real fertility supplement labels (CoQ10, myo-inositol, folate, and more): brand, product name, form, full ingredient list, and on/off-market flag.
NIH Office of Dietary Supplements
CFSAN adverse-event reports for foods and dietary supplements, keyed by supplement ingredient or brand.
U.S. Food & Drug Administration
Chemistry for supplement ingredients (CoQ10, myo-inositol, folate): CID, molecular formula and weight, IUPAC name, and synonyms.
U.S. National Library of Medicine
News & journals
The authoritative peer-reviewed reproductive-medicine journal feed (ASRM's Fertility and Sterility, via ScienceDirect RSS).
American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM)
Consumer-facing fertility and reproductive-health research news.
ScienceDaily
Neutrality, and the caveats we never hide
IVFcost.co compares by the underlying data: success rate, cost, and services. Who pays us never changes a rate or a fact. We show a figure only when we have a real source for it, and when we do not, we show an honest gap, never an invented number.
Authorship and expertise
Every figure on IVFcost.co is drawn from primary sources (the CDC ART program for clinic success rates, the U.S. National Library of Medicine for the research literature, the NIH DSLD for supplement labels, and the ASRM journal Fertility and Sterility for reproductive-medicine research) and links back to the record that proves it. We publish what the sources say, cite where it came from, and stamp when we retrieved it.