Overall Star Ratings Declined for Multiple Medicare Advantage Part C Insurers

November 6, 2025

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) created the Part C & D Star Ratings to provide quality and performance information to Medicare beneficiaries to assist them in choosing their health and drug services during the annual fall open enrollment period. For this year’s scores, CMS continued to make multiple changes to the methodology used to determine the star ratings. Among them were changes to the weight of the patient’s experience, complaints, and access measures - it decreased from 4 to 2. CMS re-specified Part C Improving or Maintaining Physical Health and Improving or Maintaining Mental Health measures; these moved into the 2026 Star Ratings as new measures with a weight of 1 for the first year. The Part C Kidney Health Evaluation for Patients with Diabetes measure also moved into the 2026 Star Ratings as a new measure with a weight of 1.[i] For this analysis, Mark Farrah Associates (MFA) used Medicare Benefits Analyzer™, a product that helps simplify analysis of the Medicare.gov data and includes details on the Star Ratings metrics and enrollment for companies competing in Medicare Advantage (MA). This brief presents a snapshot of the overall 2024 to 2026 MA Star Ratings for Part C. 

Medicare Star Ratings

All health and drug plan ratings are reported at the contract level. MA plans with prescription drug coverage (MA-PD) contracts are rated on a maximum of 9 domains comprised of a maximum of 45 measures; MA-only contracts (without prescription drug coverage) are measured on 5 domains with a maximum of 33 measures; and stand-alone Prescription Drug Plan (PDP) contracts are rated on 4 domains with a maximum of 12 measures. The contract (and plans within the contract) are rated on a 1- to 5-star scale, with 1 star for poor performance and 5 stars for excellent performance. Based on an analysis of CMS Star Ratings information from Medicare Benefits Analyzer, a total of 706 MA contracts, made up of 5,598 distinct MA plan offerings, are in the market lineup for 2026. This includes MA-only, MA-PD plans, and Special Needs Plans (SNPs) and, for this analysis, excludes PDP contracts and MA plans offered by employers.

• A total of 18 active MA contracts received a 5-star rating for the 2026 rating year, down from the 36 contracts that received this distinguished rating for 2024. For 2026, 2.5% of all MA contracts were rated as 5-stars, up from 1.0% last year, and down from over 4.5% of all MA contracts for 2024.
• For 2026, all the MA 5-star rated contracts included SNPs, which were active during the rating contract year and still available for 2026. A SNP offers benefits and services to people with specific conditions, certain health care needs, or who also have Medicaid.
• In the most recent rating year, 11 separate parent companies received a 5-star rating. Elevance Group and Devoted Health Group had the most contracts, with three each, receiving this accolade; followed by UnitedHealth, Alignment Healthcare Holdings Group, and Longevity Health with two contracts, respectively.
• Three contracts have received 5-star ratings in 2024, 2025, and 2026: Alignment Healthcare Holdings’ Alignment Health Plan of North Carolina (NC), H5296, with 20,990 members, as of September 2025, primarily in Nevada and NC; Leon Health Holdings’ Leon Health Plan, H4286, with 39,426 members, primarily in Florida; and MHH Healthcare Group’s MCS Classicare, H5577, with 329,768 members, primarily in Puerto Rico.
• The number of contracts not rated (0-Stars) dropped from 264 to 204 between 2024 and 2026. CMS requires plans to be in the market for three years and have a certain amount of data to be rated.

About Medicare Benefits Analyzer

Medicare Benefits Analyzer™ is a time-saving database for easy comparative analysis of Medicare premiums, co-pays and benefits. MBA now includes analysis tools to help facilitate your assessment of the benefits data. Benefits and Star Quality Ratings data is collected and organized from the Medicare.gov website and is updated within days of the new benefits data being posted by CMS, usually during the first and second weeks of October, with periodic data refreshes. Interactive web tables present: Medicare Advantage (MA) and Prescription Drug Plan (PDP) benefits, premiums, co-pays, prescription (Rx) drug tiers & cost estimates by Plan, State & County; Star Quality Ratings data for measuring relative quality of MA & Part D plans; Drug tier costs by state presents standard and preferred pharmacy cost-sharing by drug tier, purchase type and supply for all MA & Part D plans; Plan Finder profiles by state and plan with screen-shots of benefit details for easy look-up and reference; Medicare Advantage & PDP enrollment figures per plan and current Summary Star Ratings; and user-friendly web interface with easy-to-navigate tables, downloadable to Excel. Medicare Benefits Analyzer™ subscriptions all include access to Medicare Business Online™ for the latest MA & PDP enrollment data.

About Mark Farrah Associates (MFA)

Mark Farrah Associates (MFA) is a leading data aggregator and publisher providing health plan market data and analysis tools for the healthcare industry. Our product portfolio includes Health Coverage Portal™, County Health Coverage™, Medicare Business Online™, Medicare Benefits Analyzer™, 5500 Employer Health PLUS, and Health Plans USA™. For more information about these products, refer to the informational videos and brochures available under the Our Products section of the website or call 724-338-4100.

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