Comparison · for employers, health plans and benefits consultants
Levels vs Calibrate
Levels is a metabolic health benefit for your whole population, with a GLP-1 companion program for members on medication, backed by an IRB study of 62,236 members. Calibrate is a GLP-1 weight-loss program for members with obesity, pairing its affiliated prescribers with 1:1 video coaching, sold through PBMs like OptumRx and midway through a pivot from consumer to enterprise.
Decide in 20 seconds
- Glucose data, not a scale and a lesson
- Levels
- A benefit every member can use
- Levels
- Evidence with cohort sizes published
- Levels
- Four-year weight data on a GLP-1 cohort
- Calibrate
The short answer
Calibrate runs the prescription. Levels changes what happens around it, for everyone.
Calibrate enrolls members with a BMI of 30, or 27 with a related condition, into a branded-GLP-1 program: a smart scale, annual labs, a lesson curriculum, and a coach on 15-minute video calls every other week, with medication written by its affiliated practices and billed to your PBM. Its four-year weight data is real, and so is its history: three CEOs since 2023, two rounds of layoffs, a PE-led recapitalization, and a consumer review record split between 1.2 and 4.5 stars. Levels gives every member CGM, labs, food logging and personalized guidance, adds a companion program for anyone on a GLP-1, and publishes the study behind it, limitations included. One is a gate in front of the drug. The other is the reason results hold after it.
Levels fits when
You want results that outlast the prescription
- You already cover GLP-1s through your PBM and don't want a second prescriber. You want members who finish the year and keep the weight off.
- You want something the whole population can use, including members who don't clear a BMI threshold.
- You want members to see cause and effect in their own glucose, not a weekly weigh-in and a lesson.
- Your diligence team will check vendor stability and support quality as closely as outcomes.
Calibrate fits when
You want a PBM-integrated gate with prescribing built in
- Your GLP-1 coverage runs through OptumRx or another major PBM and you want enrollment in a clinical program as the condition of coverage, the way FedEx does it.
- Your target is a high-BMI cohort and you want one vendor to prescribe branded GLP-1s, coach and taper, with weight data out to four years.
- You want half the program fee at risk against sustained 10% weight loss at 24 months, and a defined-contribution design for the drug.
- You want a Validation Institute reviewed outcomes report to hand your consultant.
At a glance
What each one hands you.
Functionality first, price last. Calibrate entries come from their own public materials, and we say so where they publish nothing. Levels entries come from the study behind the program.
What you’re comparing
Levels
Population benefit, GLP-1 companion
Calibrate
GLP-1 program, obesity-gated, PBM-led
Who it covers
Devices and data
Care team
GLP-1 approach
Who prescribes
Published evidence
Biomarker outcomes
Below GLP-1 thresholds
Independent validation
Security and privacy
Reporting to you
Financial model
Calibrate entries come from joincalibrate.com, calibratehealth.com, its legal and results pages and its National Alliance listing, read September 2026. They describe what Calibrate publishes. Where they publish nothing we say "not published" rather than claim the product can't do it. Calibrate's outcome and savings figures are its own reporting from members still enrolled. Levels figures come from our IRB-approved study at levels.com/pro/outcomes, which is observational, participant-funded and has no control arm. The cohort size sits next to every number. If a row is out of date, tell us and we'll fix it.
What it costs
Where the money goes, and who carries the risk.
Neither company publishes employer pricing. Calibrate's program fee sits on top of the drug, which your PBM still pays for. What you can compare is the shape of the deal: who it covers, what the fee rides on, and what each vendor's own numbers say.
Levels · population benefit
62,236
consented members in the study behind the program. 1.15B glucose readings across 3.5 years.
- One benefit for the whole population, with the GLP-1 companion program included for anyone on medication, at whatever coverage level you set.
- Works with the prescribers and PBM you already have. No second clinic, no medication decisions handed to a vendor.
- Pricing is scoped to your population in consultation. The study is public before you ask.
Calibrate · program fee plus the drug
Not published
for the fee. Medication billed separately to your PBM.
- Half the program fee rides on sustained 10% weight loss at 24 months. The other half, and the drug, don't. Contributions pause if a member disengages.
- 25 to 50% GLP-1 spend reduction is Calibrate's projection, not a claims result. Its illustration puts $13M to $22M in savings on a $43M spend for 50,000 lives.
- Consumer members pay $199 a month with a money-back promise that excludes employer-sponsored members, and a complaint record about how it's honored.
The bill you already pay
Half of it stops early.
About half of members stop GLP-1 therapy within the first year, and most of the lost weight comes back. That's from the Peterson Health Technology Institute's December 2025 report and the STEP 1 trial extension, not from us. Careful prescribing changes who starts. Changing daily behavior changes who finishes, and what's left a year after the last dose.
Being fair
Where Calibrate is the better call.
Three situations where we wouldn't recommend Levels over Calibrate. Better you hear it here than mid-RFP.
Your PBM wants a gate, with prescribing inside it.
If GLP-1 coverage should require enrollment in a clinical program, and you want that program to write the prescription, Calibrate has run exactly that with OptumRx and FedEx since 2023. Levels doesn't prescribe.
You want four years of weight data.
Calibrate has reported weight loss out to 48 months on tens of thousands of members and had a 16,098-member report reviewed by the Validation Institute. Our study is IRB-approved and clinically reviewed, but not yet independently validated.
You want the program fee at risk.
Calibrate puts half its fee against sustained 10% weight loss at 24 months. If your RFP requires fees at risk, ask us how we contract. We don't publish it, so don't assume either way.
If one of those is you, take the Calibrate meeting, and ask about support response times and leadership tenure while you're there. Come back when you want something the whole population can use, and a study your consultant can pull apart.
Working alongside
You can run both. Many populations should.
Calibrate is scoped to members with obesity who enroll, and lives inside your PBM's coverage rules. Levels is scoped to everyone. Nothing here asks you to cancel a PBM program. The open question is what the rest of your population gets, and what happens to GLP-1 members once they taper.
- 01
Start with the members Calibrate doesn't cover
Launch the Levels wellness benefit to all eligible members. Anyone enrolled in a PBM program stays exactly where they are.
- 02
Wrap the GLP-1 members you already pay for
Add the companion program alongside your PBM coverage, from first dose through discontinuation. CGM and labs show what a scale can't.
- 03
Read the participation report at renewal
Eligibility, participation and spend in one view. Decide on your own numbers.
Questions we get
Four straight answers.
- Is Levels a replacement for Calibrate?
- Not one for one. Calibrate is a GLP-1 program that prescribes for members with obesity. Levels is a population benefit that works with the prescribers you have. Many employers need the second even if they buy the first, because Calibrate covers members above a BMI threshold and Levels covers everyone.
- Does Levels prescribe GLP-1s?
- No. Your PBM and your members' clinicians do. Levels works before medication, with CGM, labs and guidance, and alongside it, with nutrition, movement and side-effect support. The point is what's still true a year after the last dose.
- How does the evidence compare?
- Ours is an IRB-approved longitudinal study of 62,236 consented members and 1.15 billion glucose readings over 3.5 years. Cohort sizes, methods and limitations are at levels.com/pro/outcomes. Calibrate's is a set of company reports and conference posters on members still enrolled, out to four years, with a 2024 Validation Institute review. Neither is peer-reviewed or randomized. Read both, and check the denominators.
- What does Calibrate cost?
- They don't publish employer pricing. Consumers pay $199 a month with a three-month minimum, with medication and labs billed separately. Enterprise deals add a defined employer contribution toward the drug and put half the program fee at risk on 24-month weight loss. Get the refund and disengagement terms in writing. Consumer complaints center on both.
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See the evidence next to the pitch.
Bring your GLP-1 utilization and population size. We'll show you what our study says, what it doesn't, and what a plan built around your members looks like.
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