Function Health Review

Function Health launched in 2023 and became one of the default direct-to-consumer biomarker platforms almost immediately. The pitch is simple: $499 a year, 100+ biomarkers, two draws, clinician-written commentary on every result, and the raw data downloadable whenever you want it. Two years on, the panel is still the core of the product and it is still priced at the same number.

What has not changed is the shape of the gap. Function measures broadly and explains clearly. It does not treat. If a marker comes back out of range, the platform tells you what the marker means and suggests you see a doctor — it will not become that doctor. Whether that gap matters depends entirely on whether you already have a clinician who will read a 100-marker panel with you.

Public litigation

Function Health is the plaintiff in an open federal lawsuit against Superpower Health alleging false advertising and unfair competition under the Lanham Act (C.D. Cal., filed January 2026). These are allegations, not findings — Justia docket 2:26-cv-00810.

Scorecard

Seven categories, scored on the same rubric applied to every platform on this site. Scores reflect what the base membership includes, not what is achievable once add-ons are stacked on top.

What you get for the money

The $499 membership is a testing subscription, not a care subscription. Everything below is included at that price with no additional charge.

• A 100+ biomarker base panel, drawn twice a year. Coverage spans cardiovascular, metabolic, thyroid, immune, nutrient, hormone, kidney, liver, blood count, and heavy-metal groups.
• Clinician-written commentary on every result. Each marker carries a plain-language explanation of what it measures and what an out-of-range value suggests.
• Flagged deltas across time. The dashboard highlights markers that moved between draws, which is the part of the product that gets more useful in year two than year one.
• Full downloadable results. PDF and CSV export of raw values with reference ranges. You can hand the file to any physician without an intermediary.
• Reference-range context. Results are shown against both standard lab ranges and tighter optimal ranges, which is the difference between "not flagged" and "not ideal".

Sold separately: advanced cardiac panels, hormone deep-dives, food-sensitivity testing, multi-cancer screening through a partner test, and any draw beyond the two included. A live physician consult is also an add-on rather than a membership feature. That is the single most common source of surprise on the bill.

What it costs

The headline is $499. The number most members actually pay is higher, because the add-on panels cover exactly the areas people sign up curious about — hormones and cardiac risk. Below is the line-item view, including what year two looks like once the novelty of the first panel has worn off.

Two spending notes worth planning around. First, add-on panels are priced per panel, not bundled, so buying three at once costs three times as much — pick the one that maps to a question you actually have. Second, if you find yourself wanting quarterly draws, the per-draw economics stop favouring a two-draw membership, and a physician-led program with retesting built into the fee becomes the cheaper structure.

Signing up and the first visit

Onboarding is short. You buy the membership online, complete a health intake, and book a draw at a partner lab location — Quest and LabCorp sites cover most of the US. The intake takes about ten minutes and asks about medications, supplements, symptoms, and goals; the answers shape which optional markers are suggested, not which base markers are run.

The draw itself is a standard venous blood draw, typically eight to ten tubes, and takes ten to fifteen minutes — not a self-collect kit, which matters because collection method changes which markers can be trusted. Fasting is required for the metabolic and lipid markers, so book a morning slot and go in without breakfast. Anyone tracking hormones should book before 9am, because testosterone and cortisol both follow a diurnal curve and an afternoon draw makes year-over-year comparison unreliable.

Results land in the dashboard over 7–14 days. Send-out and advanced panels can trail the main set, so a complete report sometimes arrives in two batches. What you get is a marker-by-marker breakdown, an out-of-range summary, written commentary, and a downloadable file. From purchase to a full report in hand, budget three to four weeks.

What the panel covers

The 100+ markers group into recognizable clinical clusters. Named specifics matter here, because "100+ biomarkers" is a count that different platforms reach with very different mixes.

• Cardiovascular. Standard lipid panel plus ApoB, Lp(a), and hs-CRP — the three that add the most independent risk information beyond LDL-C.
• Metabolic. Fasting glucose, fasting insulin, HbA1c, and uric acid. Fasting insulin is the marker that moves years before glucose does.
• Thyroid. TSH, free T3, free T4, and thyroid antibodies — a fuller set than the TSH-only screen most primary-care visits run.
• Hormones. Total and free testosterone, estradiol, SHBG, DHEA-S, and cortisol in the base panel, with deeper coverage available as an add-on.
• Nutrients. Vitamin D, B12, folate, ferritin, iron saturation, and magnesium.
• Organ function. Full kidney and liver panels, plus a complete blood count with differential.
• Toxins. Heavy metals including lead, mercury, and arsenic.

One interpretation caveat that trips people up: ferritin is both an iron-storage marker and an acute-phase reactant. If you are inflamed — recent illness, hard training block, elevated hs-CRP — ferritin reads high regardless of your actual iron status. If ferritin is already high, iron supplementation is the wrong response, and the body has no active route to excrete the excess.

Strengths

• Panel breadth per dollar. 100+ markers for $499 including two draws is at the top of the diagnostic tier on coverage relative to price.
• Data portability. Raw values export cleanly to PDF and CSV, so the results are usable by any outside clinician without re-testing.
• Longitudinal design. The dashboard is built around movement between draws rather than a single snapshot, which is where the value compounds.
• Optimal-range framing. Showing results against tighter optimal ranges, not only lab reference ranges, surfaces drift that a standard panel would mark normal.
• Written interpretation on every marker. Nothing is left as a bare number, which lowers the knowledge barrier considerably for a first-time user.
• Established operational track record. Two years of running at scale through Quest and LabCorp means draw logistics are a solved problem in most US markets.

Trade-offs

• No physician relationship in the base price. A live consult is an add-on, so acting on results requires a clinician you source yourself.
• No prescriptions. Function does not treat. Findings that call for therapy route back to your own doctor.
• Two draws a year is the ceiling. Anyone titrating a protocol wants results every 8–12 weeks, and that cadence is not what the membership is priced for.
• Add-ons carry the real cost. The areas most members want depth in — hormones and cardiac — sit outside the $499.
• No imaging. Blood only. Structural findings need a separate whole-body MRI or CT provider.
• Access has been intermittent. Membership has been waitlisted at points, so sign-up timing has not always been on demand.

How it compares

The three platforms below are the closest peers to each other in the diagnostic tier — broad panels, no bundled physician, no prescribing. They are listed alphabetically, and the same six criteria are applied to each.

Against Superpower, the price and panel size are effectively level, so the decision is about interface and add-on pricing rather than coverage. Against InsideTracker, the split is structural: Function gives you more markers and a subscription, InsideTracker gives you fewer markers and a recommendation engine with no commitment. If you test once and never return, InsideTracker costs less. If you test twice a year for two years, Function costs less per marker.

Who should buy it — and who should not

Buy it if:

• You want the broadest reasonable blood panel at a fixed annual price and are comfortable reading results.
• You already have a physician who will review a 100-marker panel with you.
• You plan to stay on the platform for two or more years, because trend data is where the value accrues.
• You want raw exportable data rather than a proprietary score.

Look elsewhere if:

• You need prescriptions and dose management — buy a physician-led program such as Lifeforce, Marek Health, or Opt Health instead.
• You want retesting every 8–12 weeks during a titration — buy Marek Health, which is priced around that cadence.
• You want personalized food and training recommendations rather than marker commentary — buy InsideTracker.
• You are looking for structural findings, not blood chemistry — buy a whole-body scan from Prenuvo or Ezra.

Retesting and what year two costs

The membership renews at $499 and includes the same two draws and the same 100+ panel. Nothing about the base offer degrades in year two, and nothing expands either — the renewal buys repetition, which is the point.

Add-ons do not carry over. If you bought an advanced cardiac panel in year one, repeating it in year two is another $100–$400. Most members who continue land in the $600–$900 range, buying the membership plus one repeat add-on rather than the full set again. That is usually the right call: the base panel is what you want annual continuity on, and a deep-dive panel is worth repeating only if the first one found something to track.

A practical scheduling rule for year two: book the second-year draw at the same time of day and the same point in your training week as the first. Hard exercise within 48 hours elevates hs-CRP and creatine kinase, and a fasted 7am draw is not comparable to a fed 3pm draw. Controlling those two variables removes most of the noise people mistake for a real trend.

Related

• Is Function Health worth it?
• Function Health cost breakdown
• Function Health vs Superpower
• InsideTracker vs Function Health
• Function Health alternatives
• Function Health discount codes
• Doctor-led options compared