Embrace vs Healthy Paws
Healthy Paws wins for most owners: unlimited payouts and our top score of 9.3/10 against Embrace at 8.8. Accident cover waits 15 days in most states. Embrace fights back with two things Healthy Paws does not have: a wellness allowance, and a curable-pre-existing path after 12 symptom-free months (Lemonade has a similar path in most states). Embrace also cuts your deductible by $50 every claim-free year. Both can be configured with an unlimited annual limit; Embrace accident and illness limits run from $2,000 to unlimited, with no lifetime maximum. Pick Healthy Paws for the unlimited default, Embrace if your pet has a curable condition in its history or you rarely claim.
Get a Lemonade quote
Lemonade is the one insurer on this site we can send you to for a live quote. That does not make it the right plan for every pet. As of October 2, 2026, Lemonade Pet is not yet available in Alaska, Idaho, Kansas, South Dakota, Vermont, West Virginia, or Wyoming.
Get a quote from LemonadeSide by side
| Embrace | Healthy Paws | |
|---|---|---|
| Editorial score (dogs) | 8.8/10 | 9.3/10 |
| Annual limit | $2k-unlimited | Unlimited |
| Deductible | Annual, $100 to $1,000 ($100/$250/$500/$750/$1,000). Drops $50 for every claim-free year via the Healthy Pet Deductible. | One annual deductible, chosen at enrollment: $100, $250, $500 or $1,000 |
| Reimbursement options | 70%, 80% or 90% | 70%, 80% or 90% |
| Accident wait | Covered as soon as the policy is effective | 15 days after the policy effective date in most states. 0 days in CA, DE, FL, HI, LA, MD, ME, MS, MT, NE, NH, OH, PA, RI, VT, WA for accident-related conditions (those states still apply a 15-day wait to illness, injury and orthopedic conditions not from an accident) |
| Illness wait | 14 days | 15 days after the policy effective date |
| Orthopedic / cruciate wait | 6 months for cruciate ligament injury, IVDD and hip dysplasia , cut to 14 days if your vet performs an orthopedic exam and submits it within your first two weeks | Hip dysplasia waits 12 months in most states for pets enrolled at age 5 or below, or 30 days in CA, DE, FL, HI, LA, MD, ME, MS, MT, NE, NH, OH, PA, RI, VT and WA (depends on state). Pets enrolled at 6 or older are not covered for hip dysplasia at all |
| Wellness add-on | Available | Not offered |
| Direct vet pay | No, reimbursement only | Yes (VetDirect Pay) |
Compare current quotes for the same pet and ZIP code, using the same deductible, reimbursement rate, annual limit, and add-ons. Older catalog price examples do not establish which insurer costs less today.
Pre-existing conditions
Embrace: Curable pre-existing conditions (like an old ear infection or a one-off bout of vomiting) can be re-evaluated and covered again after 12 consecutive symptom-free, treatment-free months. Chronic conditions (diabetes, ongoing allergies, chronic orthopedic issues) stay excluded for good. Few competitors distinguish curable from chronic this explicitly.
Healthy Paws: Not covered. A condition counts as pre-existing if it showed any sign, even undiagnosed, before your policy started or during the 15-day waiting period. If one knee's cruciate ligament was hurt before enrollment or during the wait, the other knee's cruciate is excluded too.
Choose Embrace if
Your pet had a one-off illness before enrollment (an old ear infection, a single bout of vomiting) and you want a path back to coverage, since Embrace re-evaluates curable pre-existing conditions after 12 clean months. Also pick Embrace if you claim rarely, because the Healthy Pet Deductible drops $50 every claim-free year, and if you want a wellness allowance that even covers grooming and nail trims.
Choose Healthy Paws if
You want the highest possible ceiling. Healthy Paws pays out with no annual limit and scores 9.3/10 in our rankings. Accident cover waits 15 days in most states. Skip it if you want wellness bundled in or you are enrolling a dog past age 6 and need hip dysplasia covered, because that condition is excluded outright at that age.
The exclusions cheat sheet
A plain-English guide to waiting periods and key exclusions across eight insurers, with links to the full reviews.
Questions
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Written by the WhichPetPlan editorial team. Scores are our own editorial ratings, not an industry standard. See our methodology for how scores are set.