Pet Insurance: AI Visibility Market Discovery Index

Benchmark Summary

Pets Best remained the category leader in valid recommendation coverage in October 2026 at 64.0%, ahead of Spot at 54.1%, a gap of 9.9 percentage points. Two brands recorded increases beyond normal month-to-month variation: MetLife rose 5.5 percentage points to 42.3% from 36.8% in September 2026, and Pumpkin rose 7.6 percentage points to 40.4% from 32.8% in September 2026. No brand recorded a decline beyond normal month-to-month variation between September and October 2026.

Viewed against the July 2026 baseline, the picture is mixed. MetLife and Pumpkin are the significant cumulative risers, with MetLife up 10.4 percentage points to 42.3% from 31.9% in July 2026 and Pumpkin up 12.8 points to 40.4% from 27.6%. Three brands recorded significant cumulative declines: Trupanion posted the largest, down 9.0 percentage points to 39.1% from 48.1% in July 2026, followed by Figo (down 7.4 points to 21.6% from 29.0%) and Healthy Paws (down 5.3 points to 28.8% from 34.1%). Figo and Trupanion each declined in each of the three months since July 2026.

The October 2026 benchmark reflects 723 qualified observations, compared with 724 in the July 2026 baseline.

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. August 2026 recorded a breadth of six with a recommendation-shaped answer share of 37.7%, and September 2026 also recorded a breadth of six with a share of 31.2%.

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

Research Scope and Qualification

The public benchmark reports standings against a qualified-observation denominator, not the full collection volume. The July 2026 baseline measured 724 qualified observations; the October 2026 benchmark measured 723 qualified observations after removing off-topic and non-brand responses.

Brand-level percentages in this report use the qualified observations as the public denominator. AI Visibility Market Discovery Methodology

Current Brand Standings

Questions This Section Answers

• Which pet insurance brands lead the October 2026 standings, and by how much?
• How far apart are the leaders on top-three and rank-one placement?
• Which brands appear most often but convert that presence into the fewest valid recommendations?

How to Read the Standings

• Presence rate: share of qualified observations where the brand is mentioned in any form
• Valid recommendation coverage: share of qualified observations where the brand appears in a valid recommendation context
• Top-three rate: share of qualified observations where the brand is recommended in the top three positions
• Rank-one rate: share of qualified observations where the brand is the first recommendation
• Net sentiment: positive minus negative mentions divided by total mentions

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

Recommendation Coverage Movement

Questions This Section Answers

• Which pet insurance brands moved beyond normal month-to-month variation between September and October 2026?
• Which brands are the significant cumulative risers and decliners since the July 2026 baseline?
• Which brands have declined in every month since July 2026?

Between September and October 2026, MetLife rose 5.5 percentage points to 42.3% and Pumpkin rose 7.6 percentage points to 40.4%, both beyond normal month-to-month variation. No brand declined beyond normal variation over the same period. Embrace, Nationwide, Pets Best, and Spot remained within normal variation against the July 2026 baseline.

Largest Increase: Pumpkin

Pumpkin's valid recommendation coverage rose to 40.4% in October 2026 from 32.8% in September 2026, a gain of 7.6 percentage points beyond normal monthly variation. Over the full series, Pumpkin climbed 12.8 percentage points from 27.6% in July 2026, the largest cumulative rise in the benchmark. Presence rate increased to 55.2% in October 2026 from 40.9% in July 2026, a 14.3 percentage point rise, and top-three rate moved to 17.2% from 6.5% over the same period. Pumpkin rose in each of the two months since September 2026.

Largest Decline: Trupanion

Trupanion's valid recommendation coverage declined to 39.1% in October 2026, down 9.0 percentage points from 48.1% in July 2026, a move beyond normal variation. Presence rate declined to 54.9% in October 2026 from 68.4% in July 2026, a 13.5 percentage point drop. Trupanion declined in each of the three months since July 2026.

Figo's valid recommendation coverage declined to 21.6% in October 2026 from 29.0% in July 2026, down 7.4 percentage points beyond normal variation. Presence rate fell to 36.4% in October 2026 from 46.6% in July 2026, and top-three rate declined to 5.1% from 6.6%. Figo declined in each of the three months since July 2026. Healthy Paws declined 5.3 percentage points to 28.8% from 34.1% in July 2026, with presence rate falling to 40.2% from 51.0%; it declined in each of the two months since September 2026.

Category Leader: Pets Best

Pets Best led the benchmark in valid recommendation coverage in October 2026 at 64.0%. The brand led by 9.9 percentage points over Spot at 54.1%, with Embrace at 44.4% and MetLife at 42.3%. Pets Best's top-three rate rose to 45.6% in October 2026 from 36.3% in July 2026, a 9.3 percentage point gain, and its rank-one rate rose to 10.0% from 7.3%.

Recommendation Placement Snapshot

Questions This Section Answers

• How does Trupanion's rank-one rate compare with brands that have higher overall recommendation coverage?
• Which pet insurance brand leads on both top-three and rank-one placement in October 2026?

Coverage alone does not show how prominently a brand is recommended. Among the leading brands, top-three and rank-one rates reveal differences in placement quality.

Pets Best led the field in both top-three placement (45.6%) and rank-one placement (10.0%) in October 2026. Trupanion's 8.7% rank-one rate is the second-highest among these four brands, ahead of Spot (5.7%) and Embrace (5.0%), even though Trupanion's overall valid recommendation coverage (39.1%) trails both Spot (54.1%) and Embrace (44.4%). Similar coverage levels can still hide different first-position rates.

Buyer-Intent Distribution

Questions This Section Answers

• Which buyer-intent classes do the qualified observations cover?
• Which pricing or comparison buyer intents are not yet measured in the public series?

All qualified observations in both months fell into the Brand Recommendation class.

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

• Has Pets Best led valid recommendation coverage across every month of the July–October 2026 series?
• Which brand recorded the largest single-month coverage movement in each period of the series?

Across the full July–October 2026 series, MetLife and Pumpkin are the significant cumulative risers in valid recommendation coverage, while Figo, Healthy Paws, and Trupanion are the significant cumulative decliners.

Evidence and Source Layer

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

• Market share
• Attributable sales
• Every possible AI response
• Organic-search ranking
• Social mention volume
• Private or sponsored channels
• Causality from a metric movement alone

Top 10 Cited Domains

Questions This Section Answers

• Which domains are cited most often across AI platform responses, and how concentrated is that citation share?
• Are any pet insurance brands' own domains among the most-cited sources?

Across all AI platform responses in October 2026, 6,967 citations were observed across 490 unique domains.

Citations are concentrated among a small group of domains, with the top ten accounting for a combined 46.9% of all 6,967 citations observed. No tracked brand's own domain appears in the top ten. The list is dominated by insurance comparison and personal-finance publishers such as pawlicy.com, nerdwallet.com, and insurify.com, alongside general business and news outlets including U.S. News, MarketWatch, The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and Money, with google.com and reddit.com also appearing.

About This Benchmark

The LLM Authority Index AI Visibility Market Discovery Index tracks how AI search and chat surfaces present and recommend brands within a category, using a consistent, audited prompt set each month.

• 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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