Price Comparison

Side by Side: Maintenance Pricing at the Providers That Publish It

By The Side by Side Meds Editorial Team · August 6, 2026 · 9 min read

Almost every provider publishes a starting price. Very few publish what you pay once you are stable on a maintenance dose eighteen months in. That silence is the most expensive information gap in the category.

Key Takeaways

How we built this table

Every figure here comes from the provider's own published pricing or intake flow as of our most recent verification pass. Where a provider publishes a range rather than a single number, we show the range. Where pricing only appears after you complete an intake, we say so rather than guessing. We do not estimate, average, or fill gaps — a blank is a blank.

Prices in this category move often. Treat this table as a starting shortlist and confirm the current number at checkout before you commit to a multi-month plan.

Which providers tell you what year two costs
ProviderMaintenance rate published?What year two looks like
Telos RxEffectively yes — flat by plan lengthSame monthly rate you started on for that plan; renewal terms apply
WellorithmYes — per formatPublished oral and injectable rates hold across doses
Strut Health ⚠️Yes — published bandSublingual rate published as a flat figure
SHEDYes, explicitlyTirzepatide rises to $399/mo at the 7.5 mg and higher maintenance tiers; initial term converts to a different ongoing rate
Yucca HealthPartlyOngoing monthly rate published ($275 sema / $385 tirz) alongside 6-month plan rates
MadeMedPartlyTiers published by dose; higher tiers price upward from the starting figure
Found HealthYesPer-4-week rate published; remember 13 cycles a year
Care Bare RxNoSurfaces during intake only
AgelessNoSurfaces during intake only
⚠️ FDA Warning Letter disclosure: Providers marked ⚠️ in the table above have received an FDA warning letter — Strut Health (Feb 20, 2026 · Ref. #721448). Review the FDA's published letters before ordering.

Why maintenance is where the money is

Weight-loss induction is a phase. Maintenance, on the current evidence about what happens when treatment stops, is potentially indefinite. If you are on this medication for three years, roughly thirty of those thirty-six months are at a maintenance dose. The starting price governs a small minority of your total spend.

Run the arithmetic before you sign up. A provider at $149 starting and $349 maintaining costs substantially more over three years than one at $229 flat, despite winning every headline comparison.

SHED

Multi-format
Injectable/lozenge from $199/mo · drops $229/mo · tirzepatide $299/mo, rising to $399/mo at the 7.5 mg and higher maintenance tiers

Price-jump disclosure: SHED's tirzepatide pricing increases to $399/mo once you reach the 7.5 mg maintenance tier. Budget for the higher number, not the entry number.

Compounded medications are not FDA-approved. The FDA does not review compounded drugs for safety, effectiveness, or quality before they are marketed. Compounded GLP-1 medications are prepared by state-licensed pharmacies and are not the same as FDA-approved brand products.

Wellorithm

Lowest published oral price
Oral semaglutide from $147/mo · oral tirzepatide from $249/mo

Compounded medications are not FDA-approved. The FDA does not review compounded drugs for safety, effectiveness, or quality before they are marketed. Compounded GLP-1 medications are prepared by state-licensed pharmacies and are not the same as FDA-approved brand products.

Telos Rx (Tirzepatide)

Flat pricing by plan length
$99 first month · ongoing $129–$449/mo depending on plan length

Telos publishes plan-length pricing rather than dose-tier pricing, so the number you see at signup depends on the commitment you choose, not the milligrams you take.

Compounded medications are not FDA-approved. The FDA does not review compounded drugs for safety, effectiveness, or quality before they are marketed. Compounded GLP-1 medications are prepared by state-licensed pharmacies and are not the same as FDA-approved brand products.

How to estimate an unpublished maintenance rate

Three approaches, in order of reliability:

Ask before you sign up. Message support with a specific question: what is the monthly cost at 2.4 mg semaglutide, or at 10 mg tirzepatide? A provider that answers plainly has told you something. A provider that deflects has told you something too.

Read the dose-tier schedule. Where one is published, the top tier is your maintenance number. It is often on a pricing or FAQ page rather than the landing page.

Assume the published band's upper end. When a provider publishes a range, plan for the top of it. You will rarely be unpleasantly surprised, and occasionally pleasantly.

Yucca Health

Injectable only
Semaglutide $175 first month → $275/mo · $206/mo on a 6-month plan (new-patient promo $146/mo) · tirzepatide $285 → $385/mo · $325/mo on 6 months (promo $258/mo)

Injectable only. Yucca's headline promo rate is tied to the 6-month new-patient plan — the month-to-month rate is substantially higher.

Compounded medications are not FDA-approved. The FDA does not review compounded drugs for safety, effectiveness, or quality before they are marketed. Compounded GLP-1 medications are prepared by state-licensed pharmacies and are not the same as FDA-approved brand products.

MadeMed (Injectable Tirzepatide)

Injectable
Injectable tirzepatide from $189/mo at the starting dose

Compounded medications are not FDA-approved. The FDA does not review compounded drugs for safety, effectiveness, or quality before they are marketed. Compounded GLP-1 medications are prepared by state-licensed pharmacies and are not the same as FDA-approved brand products.

Found Health

4-week billing cycle
Dissolvable semaglutide tablets from $189 per 4-week supply

A 4-week cycle means your true annual cost is 13 × the quoted price. Worth doing the multiplication before comparing against a monthly-billed competitor.

Compounded medications are not FDA-approved. The FDA does not review compounded drugs for safety, effectiveness, or quality before they are marketed. Compounded GLP-1 medications are prepared by state-licensed pharmacies and are not the same as FDA-approved brand products.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a maintenance dose?

The dose you stabilize on after escalation. For semaglutide that is commonly the upper end of the escalation schedule; for tirzepatide it varies more widely by individual response and tolerance.

Do providers raise prices between year one and year two?

Some publish an explicit conversion after an initial term. Others simply reprice by dose tier as you escalate. Both produce a higher year-two cost than the signup price.

Is flat pricing always cheaper long-term?

Not always — a flat rate set high enough can exceed a tiered provider's mid-range tier. What flat pricing reliably provides is predictability, which has value independent of the number.

Can you negotiate maintenance pricing?

Retention offers exist in this market, and asking when you are considering cancelling sometimes produces one. It is not a documented policy anywhere and should not factor into your initial choice.

Medical disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and is not medical advice. Always consult a licensed healthcare provider before starting, stopping, or changing any medication.

Compounding disclosure: Compounded medications are not FDA-approved. The FDA does not review compounded drugs for safety, effectiveness, or quality before they are marketed. Compounded GLP-1 medications are prepared by state-licensed pharmacies and are not the same as FDA-approved brand products.

Affiliate disclosure: Side by Side Meds may earn a commission when you sign up through links on this page, at no additional cost to you. Links marked "Paid link" are sponsored. This never affects our editorial assessments.