This is the best OEP ever for the ACA for several reasons:
The expanded/enhanced premium subsidies first introduced in 2021 via the American Rescue Plan, which make premiums more affordable for those who already qualified while expanding eligibility to millions who weren't previously eligible, are continuing through the end of 2025 via the Inflation Reduction Act;
A dozen states are either launching, continuing or expanding their own state-based subsidy programs to make ACA plans even more affordable for their enrollees;
100,000 or more DACA recipients are finally eligible to enroll in ACA exchange plans & receive financial assistance!
BOSTON—The Massachusetts Health Connector’s New Year deadline is looming, with residents without health coverage having until Dec. 23 to enroll in affordable, comprehensive health insurance that starts Jan. 1, 2026.
Most people who apply for health insurance through the Health Connector get help paying for their coverage through the ConnectorCare program. The Health Connector is the state’s health insurance Marketplace, the only place where residents can get help paying for their coverage, and where residents can be assured they are getting a comprehensive health plan they can count on and avoid the junk plans that lurk on search engines.
Since we're past the initial December 15th Open Enrollment Deadline for coverage starting January 1st in most states and since there's been several enrollment deadline extensions announced by various states (including two more today), I figured this would be a good time to post a completely updated rundown of just what the remaining deadlines are for every state as well as what your options are if you miss them.
This is basically a standalone version of the first section of my annual Open Enrollment Guide; I hope that separating it out will make it less overwhelming.
IDAHO: December 15th was the only deadline for 2026 coverage. If you missed it, you're pretty much out of luck unless you qualify for one of the following exceptions:
As I've noted before: While I include the passive/auto-renewal number for completeness sake, that number won't really be relevant until after the deadline for January 1st coverage passes (which was December 15th in most states, but not until 12/23 in MA & 12/31 in CA, IL, MD, NV, NJ, NM, PA, RI & VA).
More important for the moment is the total number of active enrollments, which includes both new enrollees as well as current enrollees who log into their account and actively select a plan for 2026.
In California, those come to 535,349 combined. This also means that only 23% of current enrollees had actively re-enrolled as of 12/13.
As of the same point last year (actually 1 day more; the data from last year is as of 12/14), Covered CA was reporting:
HARTFORD, Conn. (December 16, 2025) — Access Health CT (AHCT), Connecticut’s official health insurance marketplace, experienced intermittent website outages on Monday, December 15, 2025 that impacted customers who wanted to enroll by that date to have coverage starting January 1, 2026. The website has been fully restored and is now available for eligible Connecticut residents to enroll in coverage.
The Maine Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) Office of the Health Insurance Marketplace (OHIM) will release biweekly updates on plan selections through CoverME.gov, Maine’s Health Insurance Marketplace.
Plan selections provide a snapshot of activity by new and returning consumers who have selected a plan for 2026. “Plan selections” become “enrollments” once consumers have paid their first monthly premium to begin coverage. These numbers are subject to change as consumers may modify or cancel plans after their initial selection.
The deadline to select a plan for coverage beginning January 1, 2026 is December 15, 2025. Consumers who select a plan between December 16, 2025 and January 15, 2026 will have coverage beginning February 1, 2026.
...Assuming new enrollment continues to only lag slightly behind last year, there could be up to ~4 million new enrollees for 2026, which means total plan selections could potentially hit ~25 million...which would actually break last year's record of 24.3 million.
If this happens (or anything close to it), you can expect the following scenario to play out:
We're now over the hump: The initial deadline for people to enroll in ACA healthcare coverage starting on January 1st has passed in most states.
HOWEVER, there's some important caveats to this, as well as some last-minute deadline extensions in a couple of states, so let's dig in...
If you live in IDAHO, last night was the one and only Open Enrollment Period deadline.
This means that if you didn't actively select a plan for 2026, current enrollees are stuck with whatever plan Your Health Idaho automatically renewed theme into, while uninsured residents who didn't sign up by the deadline are mostly out of luck.
The exceptions to this for both categories are a) if they're members of a federally-recognized Native American tribe (or are Alaska Natives); or b) if they are (or become) eligible for Medicaid or the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP). All of these are eligible to enroll year-round.
In my annual ACA Open Enrollment Guide, the first piece of advice is always to make sure you don't miss the deadline to enroll in healthcare coverage for the upcoming year.
I then list the various deadlines for people to get covered in each state, which is December 15th in most states for coverage starting January 1st (in a handful of states the deadline for January 1st coverage is as late as New Year's Eve).
I always include the caveat, though, that if you do miss that deadline, you still have an extra month or so (January 15th in most states) to enroll for coverage starting February 1st. This means that at worst, you'll have to "go bare" for the month of January (and pray you don't get sick or injured for those 31 days) before your coverage kicks in.
With the Senate failing to pass either the Democrats bill to simply extend the enhanced tax credits by 3 more years or the Republicans bill to make everything worse yesterday, all eyes turn to the House, where something like a dozen different bills, some with bipartisan support, some not, have been thrown against the wall to see if anything might stick.
Now, it looks like one of them might actually get a floor vote next week...but only as an amendment to another healthcare bill package being pushed by GOP House leadership, which of course raises all sorts of red flags.
NEWS: Speaker JOHNSON & House GOP leaders are leaning toward giving mods a FLOOR VOTE on a bill extending enhanced ACA subsidies next week
Vote would be on FITZPATRICK bill as an amendment toOP leadership's health package JOHNSON told huddle of mods on the floor earlier he'd support amendment vote & could do it WITHOUT adding abortion funding restrictions.
