Americans are purchasing life insurance at a faster clip and the products they are choosing reveals a lot about their current concerns.
New data from LIMRA shows that whole life and variable universal life policies drove a 3% rise in total individual life insurance premium to $4.75 billion in the second quarter of 2026, while the number of new policies issued jumped 8% year over year.
New whole life premium totaled $1.77 billion, up 9% from a year earlier, with policy count growing 10%. The segment now accounts for 37% of all new individual life insurance premium sold in the United States, according to LIMRA's US Life Insurance Sales Survey released August 26.
The data reflects a pattern many advisors have observed in client conversations, that when economic uncertainty lingers, straightforward products with predictable death benefits and guaranteed cash value growth tend to win.
At the other end of the spectrum, affluent clients appear to be putting more money into variable universal life.
VUL new premium surged 13% year over year to $811 million, the strongest growth rate of any product category in the quarter. LIMRA attributed the gains to activity in high-face-amount markets and a broader equity market rebound that has made market-linked life insurance a more compelling conversation with clients who have longer time horizons and a tolerance for investment risk.
Notably, the jump in VUL premium was not accompanied by a corresponding rise in the number of policies sold — unit count was flat. That means clients are buying bigger contracts, not more of them. This is consistent with the growing use of VUL as a tax-efficient wealth transfer vehicle among high-net-worth households, where the appeal lies as much in the estate planning mechanics as in the coverage itself.
Term life as the most straightforward and cost-effective form of coverage, held its ground.
New term premium rose 6% to $824 million, with policy count up 5%. LIMRA pointed to online distributors and digital platforms as the primary driver, a reflection of how younger and middle-income consumers increasingly shop for basic income-replacement coverage without an advisor intermediary.
Term's modest but consistent growth is less a sales opportunity and more a context clue: clients who bought term online in their 30s are now in their 40s and 50s, and many will be approaching the point where conversion conversations become relevant.
Indexed universal life, one of the industry's most-discussed products over the past decade, posted its first year-over-year premium decline since the second quarter of 2023.
New IUL premium fell 9% to $1.1 billion, even as policy count rose 6%. The split between those two numbers is telling: more clients bought IUL policies, but the average premium per policy fell, suggesting buyers may be coming in at lower face amounts or that larger clients shifted their dollars elsewhere.
IUL still holds a 24% share of total new individual life premium, making it the second-largest segment. But advisors will want to monitor the trend. Concerns about illustration practices and whether projected returns reflect realistic scenarios have followed the product for years, and a premium dip (even a single quarter) may prompt more scrutiny from clients who are reassessing what they were originally sold.
Fixed universal life continued its long decline, with new premium down 3% to $233 million, marking its seventh consecutive quarterly contraction.
“The individual life insurance market extended its growth in the second quarter, powered by whole life and variable universal life premium growth and an 8% jump in policy sales,” said Bryan Hodgens, head of research at LIMRA. “That rise in policy count is a clear signal that more American families are taking steps to protect their financial futures. The value of life insurance is resonating with consumers, and our opportunity—and our responsibility—as an industry is to keep making it simpler for people to get the coverage they need.”
The overall picture is one of a market where clients are making deliberate choices. The strongest demand is at both ends of the risk spectrum, guaranteed whole life products and equity-linked VUL, while the middle ground occupied by indexed and fixed universal life is under pressure.
For advisors, that bifurcation creates a natural framework for client conversations: what does this client actually want their life insurance to do, and which product structure genuinely fits that goal?
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