Eli Lilly is cutting cash prices on bottles of Zepbound weight-loss medication
Eli Lilly’s logo appears at the company’s office in San Diego, California, USA on November 21, 2025.
Mike Blake | Reuters
Eli Lilly On Monday, the company said it is lowering cash prices for single-dose vials of its blockbuster weight-loss drug Zepbound on its direct-to-consumer platform LillyDirect, building on efforts by the company and the Trump administration to make the drug more accessible.
The announcement also comes weeks after its main competitor Novo Nordisk announced additional discounts on the cash prices of its obesity and diabetes medications.
Starting Monday, cash-paying patients with a valid prescription can receive the initial dose of Zepbound vials for just $299 per month at LillyDirect, down from the previous price of $349 per month. You can also access the next dose, 5 milligrams, for $399 per month and all other doses for $449 per month, up from $499 per month in those sizes.
Zepbound has a list price of around $1,086 per month. This price and the low level of insurance coverage for weight loss medications in the United States presented significant barriers to access for some patients.
Eli Lilly’s announcement comes just weeks after President Donald Trump signed deals with Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk to make it easier for Americans to access and pay for their GLP-1 drugs. The deals will lower the prices the government pays for the drugs, introduce Medicare coverage for obesity drugs for the first time to certain patients and offer discounted drugs on the government’s new direct-to-consumer website, TrumpRx, launching in January.
But Eli Lilly’s deal with Trump is about lowering prices for another form of Zepbound – a multi-dose pen – after it receives approval from the Food and Drug Administration.
That means Eli Lilly’s announcement Monday that it will lower prices for its existing single-dose vials could mean more patients can get discounted treatments more quickly.
“We will continue to work to provide more options – expanding the choice of delivery devices and creating new access routes – so more people can get the medicines they need,” Ilya Yuffa, president of Lilly USA and Global Customer Capabilities, said in a statement.
Single-dose vials require patients to draw up the medicine using a syringe and needle and inject it into themselves. Eli Lilly first introduced this form of Zepbound in August 2024.
It is unclear how many patients are currently using single-dose vials of Zepbound. But Eli Lilly previously said direct-to-consumer sales now account for more than a third of Zepbound’s new prescriptions.
Novo Nordisk earlier this month cut the price of its obesity drug Wegovy and diabetes drug Ozempic for existing cash-paying patients from $499 a month to $349 a month. The highest dose of Ozempic is excluded from this.
The company has also launched a temporary introductory offer that allows new, cash-paying patients to gain access to the lowest two doses of Wegovy and Ozempic for the first two months of treatment for $199 per month.
