Health insuranceWhat your insurancecovers
9 min read · Last updated August 2026 · Written and reviewed by Emma, Birth & Mother
On this page
Welcome
More is covered than you expect
In Germany, having a baby does not come with a bill. Your care through pregnancy, the birth itself, and a good stretch of the weeks afterwards is paid for by your health insurance, and you will not be handed an invoice at the end of it.
What is harder is finding out what that covers. You discover it piecemeal, usually at the moment you need it, and often in German. So this page gathers it in one place: what is included in each phase, the handful of things you may pay for yourself, how a private policy changes the picture, and how to get a straight answer from your insurer when you need one.
One caveat before the detail. Covered and available are two different things. Midwives in particular are in short supply in many areas, and your insurance paying for one does not conjure one up. Start looking early, and read Your Hebamme for how that search actually goes.
01
The two systems
Germany runs two parallel systems, and which one you are in shapes everything on this page. Statutory insurance (gesetzliche Krankenversicherung, GKV) covers around nine in ten people here, and its maternity benefits are set nationally, so they are the same whichever statutory insurer you are with. Private insurance (private Krankenversicherung, PKV) is a contract, and what it covers depends on the policy you signed.
If you are unsure which you have, look at your insurance card and the name of your insurer. Names like AOK, Barmer, TK, DAK and the various Betriebskrankenkassen are statutory. If you pay a premium that varies with your age and health, and you settle bills yourself before claiming them back, you are almost certainly private.
Everything in the next three sections describes statutory cover. If you are privately insured, read them as the benchmark, then see If you are privately insured for how to check your own policy against it.
02
Covered in pregnancy
Your antenatal care follows a national schedule, the maternity guidelines (Mutterschafts-Richtlinien), and everything in that schedule is paid for. You choose who provides it: a midwife (Hebamme) can carry out almost all of the routine checks, a gynaecologist does the scans and the finer diagnostics, and many families divide the appointments between the two. How you split them is your decision, and it costs you nothing either way.
- All routine antenatal check-ups (Vorsorgeuntersuchungen), at the intervals the guidelines set
- Three routine ultrasound scans, roughly one per trimester
- Blood tests and infection screening, and glucose screening in the middle months
- Midwife care throughout pregnancy, including appointments at home
- Extra midwife visits if the pregnancy needs them, for example for sickness, pain, or worries about the baby
- An antenatal class (Geburtsvorbereitungskurs) for the person giving birth
- Care and support if a pregnancy ends, at any stage
Two of those are worth pausing on. Midwife care in pregnancy is fully covered, and a midwife is not only for the birth: you are entitled to one from the moment you are pregnant. And the antenatal class is covered for you, though a partner's place on it usually is not, which catches people out. Some insurers reimburse a partner's fee as a goodwill benefit, so it is worth one phone call before you book.
03
Covered for the birth
All three birth settings are covered for a pregnancy that is eligible for them: a hospital (Krankenhaus), a midwife-led birth house (Geburtshaus), or your own home (Hausgeburt). Which one you choose is a question of what fits you, your family, and your wishes for this birth, rather than a question of what you can afford.
Covered with it: the midwife who attends you, the medical care around the birth, pain relief including an epidural, a caesarean where one is needed, and your hospital stay afterwards. A law that came into force in 2025 also removed the daily hospital contribution that used to be charged around maternity stays, so the stay itself no longer costs you a daily fee.
There is one recurring exception, and it is the one families most often meet unprepared. If you plan a birth at home or in a birth house, or book a Beleghebamme to attend you one-to-one in hospital, your midwife charges an on-call fee (Rufbereitschaftspauschale) for being on call around your due date. It is not part of standard statutory cover. Some insurers reimburse part of it, and how much varies, so ask yours what they pay before you book. It is covered further down under what you may pay for.
04
Covered after the birth
The postpartum entitlements are the part families most often do not know they have. All of the following is covered.
- Midwife home visits. Daily in the first ten days after birth, with a further run of visits across the first twelve weeks, and additional visits for feeding support beyond that.
- Your six-week check (Nachuntersuchung) with your gynaecologist, which closes the formal medical postpartum.
- A postnatal recovery course (Rückbildungskurs), usually up to ten sessions, starting around six weeks after birth.
- Your baby's check-ups (U-Untersuchungen) with a paediatrician, on a set schedule through the early years.
- Household help (Haushaltshilfe) where you cannot run your household because of the pregnancy or birth, which has its own guide here.
- Breastfeeding and feeding support from your midwife, and lactation consultation in some circumstances.
Household help is the least known of these and often the most useful. It is not automatic, it is applied for, and a refusal can be objected to. The guide above walks through how to ask.
05
What you may pay for
The list of things you pay for yourself is short, but it helps to see it in advance rather than at the till.
| IGeL-Leistungenextra services | Anything offered beyond the standard schedule: additional ultrasounds, certain screening tests, keepsake scans. Some are covered in particular circumstances. If you are offered an extra, it is always fair to ask the price and whether your insurance covers it before you agree. |
| Rufbereitschaftspauschaleon-call fee | Charged by a midwife who is on call for a home or birth-house birth, and by a Beleghebamme who will attend you in hospital. Some insurers reimburse part of it and the share varies, so ask yours directly. |
| Wahlleistungenhospital extras | A single or family room (Familienzimmer), or treatment by a named senior doctor. Comfort rather than care, and charged separately by the hospital. |
| Kursepartner and extra classes | A partner's place on an antenatal class, and classes outside the covered list such as pregnancy yoga or baby massage. Some insurers reimburse part of these as a goodwill benefit; it is worth asking. |
| Doulacontinuous support | Doula care is not a statutory benefit and is paid privately. A small number of insurers contribute in individual cases, so asking costs nothing, but do not plan around it. |
06
If you are privately insured
Private cover varies enormously between policies. Some match statutory maternity benefits and go beyond them; others carry limits, exclusions, or waiting periods, and most work on reimbursement, meaning you pay the bill and claim it back. None of that is a problem if you know it in advance, and all of it is unpleasant to discover in week thirty-eight.
So make one call, early, and ask about each of these by name: midwife care in pregnancy, at the birth, and at home afterwards; each of the three birth settings; any on-call fee (Rufbereitschaftspauschale); additional ultrasounds; the antenatal class; and the postnatal recovery course. Ask what is reimbursed, at what rate, and what you must submit. Then ask for the answer in writing, by email, and keep it.
A second thing to check while you are on the phone: midwives are not obliged to take privately insured clients, and some decline because private billing is more work for them. It is worth mentioning your insurance early in a midwife search so nobody's time is wasted.
07
Insuring your baby
Your baby needs their own insurance cover from the day they are born, and it does not appear by itself. On statutory insurance, children are normally covered free through a parent's policy as family insurance (Familienversicherung), but you have to register them, and there is a window for doing it that runs to a couple of months after the birth. Miss it and the cover can start late, so put it on the after-birth list with the registry office and the benefit applications.
You will need the birth certificate to do it, which means the sequence matters: register the birth first, then the insurance, then the benefits. If one parent is statutory and one private, which policy your baby can join follows rules about the parents' incomes, and that is a question to put to both insurers rather than to guess at.
The order of the whole after-birth paperwork run, offices and all, lives in Registering your baby.
08
When to ring your Krankenkasse
Your health insurance (Krankenkasse) pays most of what your maternity care costs directly, so you will rarely see a bill. There are a handful of moments where it is worth ringing them anyway:
- 01
First trimester
Three things worth sorting out as soon as you know you are pregnant:
Your bonus programme (Bonusprogramm). Many insurers give you points or money back for pregnancy check-ups and courses.
Your insurer's pregnancy app and welcome pack. Most have one, often with reminders and English-language material.
Which individual health services (IGeL) they offer or pay towards. These sit outside the standard cover and you pay for them yourself otherwise. In pregnancy that usually means extra ultrasounds, toxoplasmosis and CMV screening, group B streptococcus (GBS) testing, and Doppler scans.
On private insurance (PKV), ask specifically about midwife care, birth setting, and on-call fees (Rufbereitschaftspauschale). On statutory cover (GKV) the routine care is covered and you don't need to ring anyone.
- 02
Mid pregnancy
Ask what else your insurer offers. Some run midwife matching (Hebammenvermittlung), and some pay for ultrasounds or tests outside the routine ones. Many have a helpline or counselling for a difficult or high-risk pregnancy, and that is a number worth having before you need it.
- 03
Late pregnancy
Your insurance details go on file at your birth place at the registration appointment (Anmeldegespräch), so take your insurance card. This is also the point to ask about a family room (Familienzimmer), so a partner can stay the night. Cover differs between insurers and some pay part of the cost.
- 04
First week after birth
Register the baby with your health insurance. Their card can take a few weeks to arrive.
- 05
First weeks postpartum
Check that your recovery course (Rückbildungskurs) and any breastfeeding consultations are being paid by your insurer. Ask about osteopathy too: many insurers pay for part of a set number of sessions, which some parents use for themselves or the baby in the weeks after the birth.
09
Asking your Krankenkasse well
Statutory insurers all offer the same core maternity benefits, but they differ in the extras they choose to fund, and the person on the phone will not volunteer a list. These are worth asking, and the German is there if you would rather say it or send it.
That last one matters more than it looks. Insurers answer by phone in German, quickly, and what you were told is hard to hold on to later. An email you can reread, translate, and quote back is worth the extra sentence.
10
Key German vocabulary
Every German word you will meet, searchable, in the Glossary.
A gentle note
This is information and orientation, not benefits or insurance guidance, and I do not fill in forms. Cover changes from year to year and insurers differ in what they fund beyond the national minimum, so for anything that turns on a number or a deadline, ask your own Krankenkasse directly, or a free pregnancy counselling centre such as pro familia, Caritas, Diakonie or AWO, who read these letters every day and can sit with you while you do.
Alongside you
Knowing what you can ask for
Much of what this page describes goes unclaimed because it is not well known. If you would like company while you work out what your weeks actually need, you are welcome to get in touch.