Medical Bills: AI Visibility Market Discovery Index

Benchmark Summary

Questions This Section Answers

• Which brand leads the Medical Bills AI benchmark in October 2026, and by how much?
• Which brands recorded the largest coverage shifts over the series?
• How did qualified observations and recommendation-shaped answer share change this month?

Dollar For remained the coverage leader in the Medical Bills AI benchmark in October 2026 with a valid recommendation coverage of 58.7%, down from 83.6% in July 2026. The gap to the next brand, FAIR Health, stood at 23.9 percentage points.

The largest coverage increase belonged to FAIR Health, which rose to 34.8% in October 2026 from 9.1% in September 2026, a move beyond normal month-to-month variation. The largest coverage decline over the full series belonged to Goodbill, which fell to 28.3% in October 2026 from 60.0% in July 2026. Dollar For also declined across the series, falling to 58.7% in October 2026 from 83.6% in July 2026.

Movement this month was concentrated in partial recoveries rather than fresh declines. Dollar For rose 12.1 points from September 2026, FAIR Health rose 25.7 points from September 2026, Goodbill rose 6.7 points from September 2026, and CareRoute rose 7.5 points from September 2026. None of these single-month gains exceeded normal variation except FAIR Health's.

The benchmark began with 800 prompt-surface observations in each month and produced 46 qualified observations in October 2026 after qualification, compared with 55 in July 2026.

Current Benchmark at a Glance

Qualified surface breadth counts the canonical AI surface families with at least one qualified observation: ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini, Perplexity, AI Overviews, and AI Mode. In October 2026, the benchmark captured four families: Copilot, Gemini, AI Mode, and AI Overviews. The series peaked at five families in September 2026, when ChatGPT was also captured.

For the strategic interpretation of this benchmark, read CiteWorks Studio's analysis of How AI Search Is Recommending Medical Bills

Research Scope and Qualification

Questions This Section Answers

• How does the public benchmark denominator differ from the raw prompt collection?
• Why do brand-level percentages use qualified observations rather than all collected prompts?

The public benchmark is narrower than the raw collection universe by design. The funnel below shows how observations move from the raw collection to the public denominator.

Brand-level percentages use the qualified observations as the public denominator, not the raw collection. See the AI Visibility Market Discovery Methodology for full details.

Current Brand Standings

Questions This Section Answers

• Which brands lead in valid recommendation coverage, and how far apart are they?
• How can a brand with strong presence still rank low on recommendation coverage?
• What separates Dollar For's standing from the rest of the tracked field?

This table is the primary current-month benchmark view, sorted by valid recommendation coverage.

How to Read the Standings

• Presence rate is the share of qualified observations in which the brand appears in the AI response, regardless of recommendation.
• Valid recommendation coverage is the share of qualified observations in which the AI response recommends the brand.
• Top-three rate is the share of qualified observations in which the brand appears in the top three recommended placements.
• Rank-one rate is the share of qualified observations in which the brand is the first recommended placement.
• Net sentiment is the ratio of positive to negative mentions in responses where the brand appears.

For formulas and denominator rules, see AI Visibility Market Discovery Metric Definitions.

Recommendation Coverage Movement

Questions This Section Answers

• How did each tracked brand's recommendation coverage change since the July 2026 baseline?
• Which coverage moves exceeded normal month-to-month variation, and which did not?
• What does Clearity Health's zero presence mean against an active Medical Bills market?

Largest Increase: FAIR Health

FAIR Health's valid recommendation coverage rose to 34.8% in October 2026, up from 20.0% in July 2026, a move within normal month-to-month variation across the full series but a prior-month gain beyond normal variation. FAIR Health's coverage moved from 20.0% in July 2026 to 34.5% in August 2026, then fell to 9.1% in September 2026, then rose to 34.8% in October 2026. The single-month rebound of 25.7 points from September 2026 exceeded normal variation. Among 46 qualified observations, FAIR Health received 16 valid recommendation mentions in October 2026, compared with 11 in July 2026 across 55 observations. FAIR Health's top-three rate rose to 10.9% in October 2026 from 0.0% in July 2026, and its rank-one rate rose to 2.2% in October 2026 from 0.0% in July 2026. Its net sentiment moved to 1.00 in October 2026 from 0.6 in July 2026.

Largest Decline: Goodbill

Goodbill's valid recommendation coverage fell to 28.3% in October 2026, down from 60.0% in July 2026, a move beyond normal month-to-month variation. Goodbill's coverage moved from 60.0% in July 2026 to 50.0% in August 2026, then to 21.6% in September 2026, then to 28.3% in October 2026. The prior-month gain of 6.7 points from September 2026 was within normal variation. Goodbill's presence rate fell to 30.4% in October 2026, down from 67.3% in July 2026. Among 46 qualified observations, Goodbill received 13 valid recommendation mentions in October 2026, compared with 33 in July 2026 across 55 observations. Despite the coverage decline, Goodbill's top-three rate rose to 28.3% in October 2026 from 1.8% in July 2026, and its rank-one rate rose to 10.9% in October 2026 from 0.0% in July 2026.

Category Leader: Dollar For

Dollar For remained the category leader in October 2026 with valid recommendation coverage of 58.7%, down from 83.6% in July 2026, a move beyond normal month-to-month variation. Dollar For's coverage moved from 83.6% in July 2026 to 81.0% in August 2026, then to 46.6% in September 2026, then to 58.7% in October 2026. The prior-month gain of 12.1 points from September 2026 was within normal variation. Dollar For's presence rate was 71.7% in October 2026, compared with 98.2% in July 2026. Its top-three rate rose to 28.3% in October 2026 from 1.8% in July 2026, and its rank-one rate rose to 17.4% in October 2026 from 1.8% in July 2026. Dollar For received 27 valid recommendation mentions across 46 qualified observations in October 2026, compared with 46 across 55 in July 2026.

Stable Brands

CareRoute's coverage rose to 10.9% in October 2026 from 1.8% in July 2026, a change within normal variation. CareRoute's presence rate rose to 39.1% in October 2026 from 7.3% in July 2026, and its top-three rate rose to 10.9% in October 2026 from 0.0% in July 2026. Its rank-one rate rose to 4.3% in October 2026 from 0.0% in July 2026, within normal variation, while its net sentiment stood at 0.28 in October 2026. Granted Health recorded a valid recommendation coverage of 2.2% in October 2026, up from 0.0% in July 2026, within normal variation, and received 1 valid recommendation mention across 46 qualified observations.

Clearity Health: Zero Coverage Against an Active Market

Clearity Health recorded no qualified observations in which it appeared across the series, holding at 0.0% presence rate, 0.0% valid recommendation coverage, 0.0% top-three rate, 0.0% rank-one rate, and 0.00 net sentiment in October 2026 — unchanged from July 2026. Every other tracked brand in the category, including brands with smaller footprints such as Granted Health, recorded at least some valid recommendation activity in the same period.

Dollar For records 58.7% on valid recommendation coverage, while Clearity Health stands at 0.0%. The more important issue is what that gap means for Clearity Health's recommendation position: this is not a case of Clearity Health converting presence into recommendations less often than competitors — Clearity Health has no presence at all to convert, compared with Dollar For's 71.7% presence rate. In a category where qualified observations fell from 55 to 46 and the field of answerable prompts is narrowing, every month without presence is a month in which competitors consolidate positions that are difficult to dislodge once AI surfaces establish citation patterns.

Highest-priority diagnostic: What is the minimum set of citable, LLM-retrievable content and third-party references required to move Clearity Health from zero presence to its first qualified mention in the Medical Bills benchmark?

Recommendation Placement Snapshot

Questions This Section Answers

• How do top-three and rank-one rates differ among the leading brands in October 2026?
• Why can similar coverage levels still hide different first-position rates?

Coverage alone does not show how prominently a brand is recommended. The table below shows where leading brands appear in recommendation order.

In October 2026, Dollar For and Goodbill recorded the same top-three rate of 28.3% while Dollar For held a higher rank-one rate of 17.4% against Goodbill's 10.9%. Similar coverage levels can still hide different first-position rates.

Buyer-Intent Distribution

Questions This Section Answers

• Which buyer-intent classes are represented in the qualified Medical Bills observations?
• What do the empty Pricing & Value and Multi-Brand Comparison rows mean for reading this benchmark?

All qualified observations fell into the Brand Recommendation class of discovery in July 2026 through October 2026.

The current public series measures Brand Recommendation discovery and does not yet contain qualified observations in the Pricing & Value or Multi-Brand Comparison classes.

Historical Measurement Record

Questions This Section Answers

• How has the coverage leader and leader coverage changed across the four measurements?
• Which measurement period produced the largest single-brand movement?

This is an evergreen benchmark URL. New measurements are added to the same report.

Evidence and Source Layer

Questions This Section Answers

• What does source presence in the benchmark actually establish about a brand's recommendation?
• Which source types dominate the citations behind these Medical Bills AI responses?

The benchmark is built from prompt-level observations that retain the query, AI/search surface, answer, brand outcome, recommendation placement, sentiment, and where exposed, citations or attributable evidence sources. Source presence is evidence about the information environment. It is not automatically proof that the source caused the recommendation.

Scope Boundaries

This public benchmark does not measure:

• Market share or attributable sales
• Every possible AI response to a given prompt
• Organic-search ranking positions
• Social media mention volume
• Private or sponsored channels
• Causality from a metric movement alone

Top 10 Cited Domains

Across all AI platform responses in the October 2026 measurement period, 6,684 citations were observed across 2,685 unique domains.

Citations are broadly distributed: the top 10 domains together account for roughly 28% of all citations, and the remaining 72% is spread across more than 2,600 additional domains. No tracked brand's own domain appears in the top 10. The list is led by general user-generated platforms (YouTube, Reddit, Facebook, Instagram), followed by Google's own properties, government sources such as irs.gov, and consumer financial or review destinations including discover.com and nerdwallet.com.

About This Benchmark

The LLM Authority Index AI Visibility Market Discovery Index is a neutral industry benchmark that tracks how AI-powered search and answer surfaces present and recommend brands across verticals. It records presence, recommendation coverage, placement, and sentiment using a transparent, reproducible methodology.

• AI Visibility Market Discovery Methodology
• AI Visibility Market Discovery Metric Definitions
• AI Visibility Market Discovery Research Standards
• Modeled AI Visibility Authority Value

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