While life insurance remained the largest growth segment (2,861 billion euro), it was followed by P&C (2,320 billion euro) and health (1,688 billion euro).

“The life insurance market remained robust in 2025, although the exceptional post-rate-hike boom in North America has clearly lost momentum. Global life premiums grew by 6.9% in 2025, down from the exceptionally strong 11.3% recorded in 2024 but still comfortably above historical norms. The moderation was driven primarily by North America, where the annuity boom fuelled by households locking in higher interest rates has started to lose momentum,” Allianz Research noted.

Asia, however, has further consolidated its status as the world’s largest life insurance market, supported by demographic aging, high savings rates, and less comprehensive public pension systems. The life insurance premiums in Asia grew by 9.9% in 2025, with China alone expanding by 11.4%.

“Health insurance is becoming the industry’s clearest structural growth story. Global health premiums increased by 12.3% in 2025, the strongest expansion since 2014, as aging populations, rising medical costs, and pressure on public healthcare systems continued to drive demand for private protection. North America alone grew by 14.9% as medical inflation accelerated further, with the US now accounting for more than 70% of global health premiums. Despite some normalization following the post-Covid surge, long-term growth potential remains particularly strong in Asia, where health insurance penetration is still below 1% in almost all markets,” Allianz Research said.

Among Asia’s key insurance markets, Singapore recorded strong growth of 10.7% in 2025, with total premium income rising to 39.7 billion euro. P&C insurance premiums, on the other hand, expanded by 8.3%, while life insurance premiums grew by 10.8%, well above the 2015-2025 average of 7.5%, supported by population aging and increasing demand for private pension provision. Health insurance premiums rose by 12.6%, reflecting growing demand for supplementary health coverage.

“Overall, the global insurance market is expected to grow at an annual rate of 5.3% over the next ten years, slightly above economic output. For Singapore, overall annual growth is expected to be 5.7% (nominal GDP: 3.7%). For P&C, Allianz expects global annual growth of 4.7% up to 2036 (Singapore: 5.6%). The segment will show solid growth rates in almost all markets, as the increasing need for protection is a global phenomenon,” the agency noted.

Allianz Research also remains confident about the prospects of life insurance in Asia, which can expect annual growth of 4.9% thanks to higher interest rates on the continent.

“Wider Asia remains the growth engine, driven by the need for private provision in the face of accelerating demographic change. The smallest segment, health insurance, should remain the most dynamic, with annual growth of 6.7% (Singapore: 8.4%). Asia, in particular, still has a lot of catching up to do,” it concluded.

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Somantra’s study, which tracked 20 Australian insurance brands across 34,278 real consumer conversations on Google AI Overviews and ChatGPT throughout May 2026, also arrives in conjunction with a separate GlobalData poll that found the broader industry still practicing caution about AI’s maturity, a posture that, in GlobalData’s opinion, may be costing mid-tier and specialty insurers ground that will prove difficult to recover.

Somantra’s data showed two coins of the Aussie insurance industry, an AI-first search shift and a massive stretch of the market being “unclaimed.”

“Across the detailed, intent-driven queries consumers pose to AI platforms—questions about specific coverage scenarios, eligibility conditions, and product comparisons—70% of responses named no insurance brand. Across 34,278 tracked conversations, that represents approximately 24,000 consumer research interactions in a single month in which no Australian insurer received a mention on either platform. The pool of domains cited by AI engines contracted 21% between March and May 2026, falling from 10,777 to 8,488 unique domains. As that pool narrows, the barrier to entering AI-generated recommendations rises,” Somantra noted.

“This is not a problem. This is an opportunity. Every one of those brandless responses is a gap in the market, which is proof that the right content, structured the right way and published on the sources AI engines trust, could put a brand into that answer instead of nobody at all. The window is closing. Every month, more of the long tail gets claimed by whichever brand shows up first with the right content on the right sources. Waiting for AI search to mature before acting just hands that ground to a competitor,” said Arun Prasad, founder of Somantra.

“Where AI platforms do recommend brands, attention is concentrated among a handful of insurers. On ChatGPT, three brands – Allianz, NRMA, and AAMI – accounted for half of all insurance-related mentions. Nine brands collectively covered 90% of total mentions, leaving the remaining 11 tracked brands competing for a thin slice of visibility. Google AI Overviews distributed attention more broadly, though not substantially so. Four brands reached the 50% threshold, and 11 were needed to cover 90% of mentions,” the study remarked.

Among the major industry players, Allianz recorded the highest combined total at 13,437 mentions across both platforms, followed by NRMA (at 12,524) and Budget Direct (at 10,708).

“At the other end, Ozicare appeared in 62 conversations, Coles Insurance in 517, and Qantas Insurance in 895—figures that suggest these brands are largely absent from AI-mediated consumer research, regardless of their standing on conventional search,” Prasad said, while adding, “Google gives you options. ChatGPT gives you a shortlist, and the shortlist is getting shorter. If you are not already in the top tier on a given platform, you are fighting over scraps of visibility, not competing on equal terms.”

Also, the study discovered a “low agreement” between the Google AI Overviews and ChatGPT, with both tools recommending the same brand for the same query in only 27.9% of cases in May 2026, up from 23.7% in March. In approximately seven out of 10 head-to-head comparisons, a consumer asking the same question on each platform received a different brand recommendation.

“Budget Direct illustrates the platform divergence risk in concrete terms. It led all brands on Google AI Overviews with 8,556 mentions, yet only 20.1% of its total AI visibility came from ChatGPT. For every five times Budget Direct appeared across both platforms, four of those appearances were on Google alone. As consumers increasingly use ChatGPT alongside Google to research financial products, a brand with that degree of platform concentration carries exposure it may not yet be measuring. For brands currently underrepresented on one platform, the divergence also creates an opening. Because Google AI Overviews and ChatGPT are forming their assessments of brand authority independently, a brand shut out of one platform’s preferred list may retain room to establish presence on the other,” the report said.

“The dual combination of expanding opportunity surface area and divergence in brand recommendations between the AI search engines is the biggest opportunity for brands right now. Large brands have spent a decade optimizing for a single search engine. That playbook does not transfer to a world where two major platforms disagree most of the time and where most of the specific questions consumers ask are not being answered by anyone,” Prasad remarked.

“The opportunity is not evenly distributed across product lines, and the distinction matters for insurers assessing where AI search effort is most likely to yield results. Car insurance generated the highest volume of brand mentions at 22,777, followed by home and contents at 20,591 and motorcycle at 16,376. In these categories, established brands have accumulated visibility that a new entrant or smaller competitor would need sustained effort to displace,” he added further.

Pet insurance and life insurance, on the other hand, presented a different picture. Pet recorded 2,457 total brand mentions across both platforms, and the life segment registered 1,283. Also, these are the same categories where fewer brands currently feature in AI-generated responses.

“An insurer in either line that moves early to build presence on the sources AI engines cite faces less entrenched competition than one attempting to gain ground in car or home, where category leaders have already established substantial leads,” Somantra explained.

“Within categories, those leads are significant. Allianz held 3,941 mentions in travel insurance; NRMA led car with 3,238; QBE led motorcycle with 2,896; and Budget Direct led pet with 940. The same brandless-query dynamic that applies across the market applies within these product lines: second and third-tier brands trail category leaders by margins that the data suggests are widening with each reporting cycle,” it added further.

The two-month gap between Somantra’s March and May audits produced movement across the board, with AI search visibility appearing responsive to recent content and citation activity in a way that shifts the competitive position of brands more quickly than conventional organic search typically does.

“Allianz added 960 mentions to move past NRMA into the top overall position. Budget Direct posted the largest percentage gain among tracked brands, up 9.7%, displacing AAMI from the top three. AAMI recorded the steepest absolute decline, losing 2,147 mentions – an 18.1% drop. Bingle fell 30.8%, GIO fell 29.3%, and CGU dropped 27.8%. Citation patterns on ChatGPT also shifted. In March, Canstar was the platform’s most-cited domain with 232 references. By May, both Finder and Canstar each exceeded 900 citations, with Finder taking the top position at 902. Reddit climbed from 147 to 387 citations, reflecting a source mix that extends well beyond traditional comparison-site ecosystems,” Somantra concluded.

Talking about the GlobalData poll of 113 insurance industry respondents, conducted across Q1 and Q2 of 2026, the survey reported nearly a quarter believing AI had not yet reached a level of maturity suitable for widespread use within the industry.

Ben Carey-Evans, senior insurance analyst at GlobalData, attributed the hesitation partly to the narrow scope of current implementations and to unresolved questions about accountability, as he said, “This might be because use cases to date are largely around customer service and chatbots rather than full-scale implementation. Regulation has not fully caught up yet, and there is concern around who is liable for mistakes made by AI.”

“Those liability and regulatory questions are not abstract for an industry that distributes financial products to consumers. As AI platforms increasingly surface insurance brand recommendations in response to consumer queries, the question of how those recommendations are generated and who bears responsibility when they are incomplete or inaccurate sits unresolved across the industry,” he added further.

“A shortage of in-house expertise ranked as the second-most-cited concern in the GlobalData poll. The firm’s job analytics data recorded approximately 63,293 active AI-related insurance roles in 2025—the highest on record and around 51% above 2024 levels. The hiring response reflects the scale of the gap, even as the technology continues to outpace the industry’s capacity to build expertise around it,” Carey-Evans remarked.

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The revenue from both the life insurance and non-life insurance sectors makes up the overall premium income.

According to FBNQuest analysts, the insurance industry has managed to remain resilient despite a number of macroeconomic headwinds, including high inflation, rising energy prices, and FX shortages.

The non-life industry maintained its market dominance in accordance with recent trends, with a 57% share of the overall premium income. Value-wise, the segment’s overall premium revenue rose 17% y-o-y and 34% q-o-q to N417 billion.

According to the data, the oil and gas industry contributed the most to the non-life business, with a share of 30%.

Fire insurance and motor insurance followed with shares of 22% and 15% respectively. Marine and aviation casualties, general casualties and others also contributed around 12%, 11% and 10% of total premium income, respectively.

The life insurance business, which accounted for 43% of the sector’s total premium income, grew by N48 billion (+18% y-o-y) to N309 billion in the fourth quarter of 2022.

On a cumulative basis, the insurance sector’s total premium income increased by 16% y-o-y to N1.9 trillion in FY22.

In terms of the sector’s market size, the data showed that total assets amounted to N2.3 trillion, an increase of 2% compared to the previous quarter and 4% compared to the previous year.

In terms of market size distribution of total assets, non-life business assets amounted to N1.1 trillion while life insurance assets amounted to N1.2 trillion. Based on the data, the sector’s insurance claims rose 31% sequentially to 318 billion naira in the quarter, accounting for 44% of total premium income.

Although the country’s insurance sector has continued to experience double-digit growth, there is a significant growth reason for the provision of insurance coverage to individuals, particularly those in the informal sector.

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This represents that the market is bouncing back from the adverse effects of the Covid-19 pandemic. As face-to-face meetings were banned due to the nature of the pandemic, many sales channels incurred heavy losses, especially agents.

Khor Hock Seng, LIA president told the media, “The strong showing of business results seen in the life insurance industry in the first half of this year reflects a level of stabilisation of Singapore’s economy from the immediate impact of Covid-19 in the first half of 2020. The growth in uptake of life insurance also seems to show that more people are placing greater importance on providing for their long-term financial and healthcare needs in the midst of an evolving pandemic environment.”

The main growth driver was single product premium which recorded a 106 percent year-on-year increase in weighted premiums, amounting to SG$1.28 billion. Additionally, single premium par and non-par products accounted for 84 percent of all single premium purchases and single premium-linked products made up for the remaining 16 percent.

Annual premium products also increased by 35 percent and added another SG$1.4 billion in weighted annual premiums. The insurance company also noted that the number of policies purchased online also increased as the business started working remotely due to the pandemic. During the first six months of 2021, 203,351 policies were bought online, compared to 2,952 policies from the first half of 2020.

The total new business premiums for individual health insurance amounted to SG$176.8 million and the uptake of retirement products also saw an increase of 34 percent with 22,137 policies bought in the first half.

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According to media reports, Prudential Life Assurance’s Thai unit will acquire the FWD’s exclusive rights to sell life insurance products using TMB Bank’s platform. The initial term of the partnership is 15 years. Prudential will make the payment in two installments. 

Last year, FWD acquired SCB Life subsequently followed by the signing of a 15-year bancassurance partnership with Siam Commercial Bank (SCB). SCB is Thailand’s largest commercial bank. 

Under the terms of the agreement, FWD will receive 20 billion baht for the TMB contract. The contract sale would benefit FWD in terms of easing potential antitrust concerns, especially after it agreed to pay $3 billion for operations of SCB life insurance as part of its acquisition. 

FWD said in a statement that the remaining term of FWD’s bancassurance contract will be entirely transferred to Prudential Thailand during a nine-month transition period. This transition period will begin on April 1 and remain until December 31. 

FWD Group CEO Huynh Thanh Phong, told the media that, “I’d like to thank TMB for their professionalism and long-term support during our collaboration over the past few years. This agreement benefits all parties and, most importantly, means our TMB customers will continue to receive their protection, benefits and customer servicing in accordance with the terms of their FWD policies.”

In 2017, TMB Bank and FWD renewed the contract to sell FWD products to the bank’s distribution network for 15 years, media reports said. In recent years, FWD has strengthened its insurance presence across Asia. 

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Recently, regulators in South Africa gave their approval for King Price to acquire Stangen Life Insurance from African Investment Investments for about R140 million.

King Price, which currently sells short-term insurance offering motor, household, business, and other specialist insurance products, plans to launch its life insurance brand in the next 12 months.

Chief executive at King Price, Gideon Galloway told the media, “King Price and Stangen is a partnership that just makes sense. We’re teaming up to reinvent life insurance for South Africans. We’d always planned to enter the life insurance market, which is three times the size of the short-term insurance market in South Africa, and buying an existing, niche life insurance business makes sense on so many levels.”

King Price launched its bid for the Stangen business in June 2019; however, the acquisition was subject to regulatory approval. The acquisition will give King Price access to Stangen’s 55 000 policyholders across its life cover, group schemes insurance, and funeral cover businesses.

Galloway added, “Our existing distribution channels are entrenched and we’ll rely on them to increase the scale of the Stangen book. We see huge potential for significant growth in the market. Consumers deserve a lesser burden, more reassurance, more flexibility, and more opportunities to live a little.”

Established in 2012, King Price sells more than 12,000 policies a month, with an annual premium of R2.3 billion. The company has around 760 employees in South Africa.

With the acquisition of Stangen, King Price will now compete with heavyweights like Old Mutual, Sanlam, Metropolitan and Hollard in the life insurance market.

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When asked about how Misr Insurance will achieve its growth target, Basel El Hini told the local media in Egypt that it will depend on the company achieving ambitious growth rates in various other activities.

According to him, Misr Insurance’s profits reached a record high of E£4 billion in 2019. The company recorded a 22.5 percent growth in 2019 when compared to 2018.

Basel El Hini further revealed that the state’s share in the company’s profits in 2019 increased to E£1.5 billion, which is a 98.1 percent increase when compared to 2018.

According to media reports, Misr Insurance is keen to preserve Egypt’s historic properties and maximise its value.
While Basel El Hini ruled out the possibility of the company selling these properties, he revealed that the company plans to redevelop many of them by collaborating with relevant authorities and international institutions.

It will be done through Misr Insurance’s asset management unit.

European Bank for Reconstruction and Development has appointed a special team and given it six months to study the company’s real estate portfolio and come up with a contingency plan.

Earlier this month, the Egyptian Ministry of Public Business Sector revealed that credit rating agency AM Best has affirmed the credit rating of two subsidiaries of Misr Insurance to ‘BBB’ with a stable outlook. The two subsidiaries are namely Misr Life Insurance Company and Misr Insurance Company.

The ministry also revealed that the financial strength rating of the company was affirmed at ‘B++’. A stable outlook means it is very unlikely that their outlook will be downgraded in the medium-term.

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Prior to the upheaval that began in June last year, life insurance services were being sold like hot cakes to Chinese tourists from the mainland in Hong Kong. It was also the preferred way for policy holders to get their money out of China.

AIA and Prudential, two of the leading life insurance companies in Hong Kong, were obtaining nearly 60 percent of their revenues from mainland Chinese tourists, who have to be present in person to purchase insurance in the city.

Quoting Hong Kong’s Insurance Authority, the Financial Times reported that the value of new life insurance products taken out by people in China witnessed an 18 percent drop to HK$1.2 billion in those three months till September last year.

And, in last November, the tourist footfalls from the Chinese mainland fell by 60 percent year-on-year. Financial experts have warned that the market has declined even more as the revolts have led to an increase in the anti-China mood that is already exists in the region.

According to Frank Yuen, senior analyst at Moody’s Investors Service, Chinese customers are vital to the insurance sector of Hong Kong. He said that but for the uprising, the year 2020 should be another great year.

The report further stated that to offset the decline in the number of tourists arriving in Hong Kong owing to the strife, many insurance firms have begun to bring customers by bus from the mainland to regions of Hong Kong that have remained immune to the unrest. This is being done to nullify the apprehensions expressed by tourists regarding their safety.

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It is reported that Prudential Life has a net asset value of KRW3 trillion ($2.58billion), and recorded a KRW101.2 billion ($87.2m) operating turnover in the first half of last year, while it earned KRW220.4 billion in 2018.

According to a report published by The Korea Economic Daily, the organisations that are in the fray are four indigenous South Korean financial firms – KB Financial Group, MBK Partners, Hahn & Company, and IMM Private Equity. The transaction is expected to rake in about KRW2 trillion ($1.7 billion).

Out of the five bidders for Prudential Life Korea, KB Financial Group is the biggest challenger as it seeks to boost its non-banking units through expansion. In case the KB Life Insurance is able to successfully bid for Prudential Life, its ranking will be catapulted to fifth from the current 13^th position. This will enable the firm to regain its crown as the largest financial entity in South Korea.

And, as far as the private equity firms are concerned, the organisation that stands out as a powerful force to be reckoned with is MBK Partners, which is a tested name in the buying and selling of insurance companies. The other two firms – IMM PE and Hahn & Company, of late, have evinced their desire to foray into the Korean life insurance sector and are exploring prospective transactions.

The sole overseas organisation that is involved in the bidding process is the Taiwan-based Fubon Financial Holdings. Through its existing operations of a Korean insurance company named Fubon Hyundai Life Insurance Co. Ltd., the firm has already established its presence in the country. Apart from this, it is also a strategic investor in Woori Financial Group, where it has a small stake.

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According to a report published in the Viet Nam News, the local insurers are also endeavouring to augment their overall assets by 13.3 percent year-on-year to VND514.80 trillion, while reinvesting into the economy VND433.06 trillion, or 15.1 percent more than last year.

Phạm Thu Phương, deputy director of ISA, revealed that the organisation would carry on the process of enhancing its mechanisms and guidelines, in a bid to attain its benchmarks.

He added that the ISA will concentrate on revamping to enable the insurance market grow transparently, safely and successfully in compliance with globally accepted standards.

Phuong went on to say that the ISA will concentrate all its resources especially towards the accomplishment of the amended Law on Insurance Business, and also on policies to monitor the execution of the law such that it fully adheres to the country’s socio-economic development frameworks and international regulations.

As per the report, Vietnam has one of the world’s lowest life insurance penetration levels at less than 1 percent of its GDP. The typical insurance premium in Vietnam is at $30, which is way beneath the worldwide average of $595 and the Southeast Asian average of $74.

ISA monitors an overall of 66 insurance organisations, which sell over 850 non-life insurance schemes and 450 life insurance policies.

In an attempt to boost the market and enhance the standards of insurance services, ISA is contemplating to urge the Ministry of Finance to grant licences to overseas investors in insurance and re-insurance to operate in the country.

Phuong concluded by saying that the agency will join hands with related other entities to analyse and utilise other latest insurance products this year, apart from utilising agricultural products as suggested by insurers.

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