FWD Travel Insurance Singapore Review (2025)

FWD travel insurance is one of those affordable, go-to options that many Singaporeans pick without thinking twice. Known for its value-for-money plans, it’s often seen as a no-frills travel insurance choice for budget-conscious travellers.

However, while FWD is often seen as a basic, no-frills choice, it actually offers more than just budget-friendly plans. Recently, FWD enhanced its flight delay coverage, offering $50 for every 3 hours of delay—an improvement from the previous $100 for every 6 hours.

In addition to this upgrade and regular things like medical coverage and coverage for travel inconveniences, did you know FWD travel insurance also offers protection for pre-existing medical conditions, pets, sports equipment, and car rental excess? Maybe it’s time we gave it a closer look—after all, it’s always prudent to know what exactly you’re paying for.

Let’s explore what FWD travel insurance has to offer.

FWD travel insurance MoneySmart review

1. Summary
2. Overview of coverage
3. Covid-19 coverage
4. Extreme sports coverage
5. FWD vs Starr vs Zurich Travel Insurance
6. Promotion
7. Claims process
8. Should I get FWD Travel Insurance?

 

1. FWD travel insurance summary

What is it and where is FWD from? FWD is actually an insurance company founded by Hong Kong businessman, Richard Li—you might know him better as the Hong Kong tycoon Li Ka-Shing’s son. FWD’s headquarters are based in Hong Kong, but it operates insurance in numerous ASEAN countries in the likes of Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, and so on.

FWD insurance launched in Singapore in 2016, which means it’s been in operation here in Singapore for almost 10 years now. Some of the most popular FWD insurance plans in Singapore include the FWD car insurance, FWD travel insurance, and FWD life insurance.

FWD’s travel insurance is offered across 3 plan tiers for both single and annual travel insurance. In order of least to most coverage and premium, we have:

	FWD Premium	FWD Business	FWD First
Single trip	✓	✓	✓
Annual	✓	✓	✓

The most affordable FWD travel insurance plan is FWD Premium. It’s a great choice if you’re on a budget.

As with all travel insurance plans, your premiums (the price you pay) largely depends on the country you’re travelling to:

• ASEAN: Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam
• Asia including ASEAN: Australia, Bangladesh, Bhutan, East Timor, Fiji, India, Japan, Maldives, Nepal, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, South Korea, Sri Lanka and Taiwan but excluding Hong Kong, China and Macau
• Worldwide excluding USA: All countries except USA
• Worldwide: All countries except the excluded countries below
• Countries not covered: Afghanistan, Belarus, Cuba, Democratic Republic of Congo, Iran, Libya, Liberia, North Korea, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, Yemen, The territories of Crimea including Sevastopol, Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson

Source: FWD FAQ, FAQ policy wording

 

2. FWD Travel Insurance Coverage

What does each tier of FWD travel insurance cover? And how much does each cost? Let’s compare them:

FWD Travel Insurance	Premium	Business	First
Price (ASEAN)	$34/week	$47/week	$61/week
Price (Asia)	$37/week	$59/week	$74/week
Price (Worldwide excluding USA)	$61/week	$91/week	$115/week
Price (Worldwide)	$68/week	$104/week	$140/week
Medical expenses (overseas)	$200,000	$500,000	$1,000,000
Emergency medical evacuation	Unlimited	Unlimited	Unlimited
Personal accident (death, TPD)	$200,000	$300,000	$400,000
Travel delay	$300 ($100 per 6 hours)	$800 ($50 per 3 hours)	$1,500 ($50 per 3 hours)
Trip cancellation	$7,500	$10,000	$15,000
Baggage delay ($150 per 6 hours)	$150	$600	$900
Loss/damage of personal baggage	$3,000	$5,000	$7,500
Car rental excess	NA	$500	$1,000
Sports & Adventure	Yes	Yes	Yes
Covid-19 Coverage	Add-On	Add-On	Add-On

Comparison of FWD travel insurance prices vs other travel insurance providers

As far as pricing goes, FWD’s travel insurance indeed is one of the best travel insurance plans in Singapore compared to other travel insurance companies. All 3 of its plan tiers fall below the median price other insurers charge:

To give you a better idea, budget travel insurance provider Direct Asia’s travel insurance plans range from $36 to $55 per week for an ASEAN trip—fairly comparable to FWD. On the other hand, AIG’s travel insurance plans cost $48 to $125 per week.

The same trip would cost $41 to $68 a week for FWD.

 

Comparison of FWD travel insurance coverage vs other travel insurance providers

Coverage wise, FWD’s travel insurance offers very good coverage for areas such as overseas medical expenses and travel inconveniences. The latter includes coverage for trip cancellation, travel delay, and baggage loss. It recently enhanced its travel delay coverage too—now, its Business and Premium plans offer $50 per 3 hours of delay instead of $100 for every 6 hours.

However, FWD doesn’t fare so well for baggage delay. You’re looking at coverage limits of $150 to $900, with a compensation rate of $150 for every 6 hours of delay.

 

3. FWD Travel Insurance: Covid-19 Coverage

FWD travel insurance does not automatically include Covid-19 coverage. Instead, you’ll need to purchase an add-on Covid rider on top of your travel insurance policy.

Here’s the prices and what you will be covered for in the event that you decide to purchase the FWD Covid-19 rider for your holiday:

FWD Travel Insurance: Covid rider
Price (ASEAN)	$6.75/week
Price (Asia)	$6.78/week
Price (Worldwide excluding USA)	$12.07/week
Price (Worldwide)	$12.38/week
Medical expenses (overseas)	$200,000
Emergency medical evacuation	$200,000
Overseas hospital cash	$100/day (max 14 days)
Overseas quarantine allowance	$50/day (max 14 days)
Trip disruption	$5,000
Trip cancellation	$5,000
Automatic policy extension	21 days

Source: FWD COVID-19 Enhanced Travel Benefits insurance policy wording

At about $7 to $12 per week, FWD’s Covid rider is affordable. It’s priced lower than Direct Asia’s Covid rider, which will set you back by $13.73 to $31.70 per week. However, Tiq travel insurance’s Covid rider starts from just $3+ per week.

While prices for FWD’s and Direct Asia’s Covid-19 riders are similar, the former offers more value and coverage. FWD offers $200,000 in medical coverage for their most basic plan tier, while Direct Asia’s most basic tier, DirectAsia Voyager 150. caps COVID-19 medical coverage at $150,000. FWD gives you both hospitalisation and quarantine cash allowance while Direct Asia doesn’t offer either.

Etiqa’s Covid-19 coverage for its lowest plan is comparable to FWD’s; their Covid-19 coverage isn’t flat across all plans. They offer $100,000 to $300,000 medical coverage, $500 to $1,500 quarantine allowance, and $200,000 to $500,000 for emergency medical evacuation depending on which plan you opt for. If you want higher coverage for Covid, Tiq Luxury is one way to get it, albeit at a higher premium.

 

4. FWD Travel Insurance: Extreme Sports Coverage

While FWD travel insurance’s policy wording does not explicitly state if its coverage extends to outdoor adventure and extreme sports or not, there is a FAQ blog article found on the FWD website that tells us that FWD Travel Insurance covers most recreational and licensed outdoor adventure activities.

FWD Travel Insurance Outdoor Adventure	Covered
Hot air balloon	Yes
Scuba diving	Yes
Skiing and other ice, snow sports	Yes
Hiking, trekking	Yes (up to 3,000m)
Mountaineering, outdoor rock climbing	Yes (up to 3,000m)
Marathons and other competitions	No
Jet skiing	Yes
White water rafting	Yes
Skydiving	Yes
Paragliding, hang gliding, parachuting	Yes
Bungee jumping	Yes

Considering that most outdoor activities are covered, their lowest tier plan (FWD Premium) is very good value for money.

 

5. FWD vs Starr vs Zurich Travel Insurance

If you were to compare FWD travel insurance against other budget insurance brand names such as Starr and Zurich, you’ll realise that FWD is way less expensive at first.

However, we need to add in the Covid-19 rider cost to make a better comparison.

You’ll then realise that FWD isn’t priced lower than the other budget insurers; it’s comparable to Starr, but more expensive than Zurich.

At the end of the day, you’re still getting what you paid for. While Zurich travel insurance is more affordable, it also offers less coverage. Starr travel insurance is around the same cost as FWD, and so is its coverage offered.

	FWD Travel Insurance	Starr Travel Insurance	MSIG Travel Insurance
Price (per week)	$34 – $61	$58 – $130	$25 – $43
Covid-19 (per week)	$6.75 – $12.38	Included	Included
Medical Expenses (Overseas)	$200,000 – $1,000,000	$200,000 – $1,000,000	$100,000 – $500,000
Emergency Medical Evacuation	Unlimited	Unlimited	Unlimited
Trip Cancellation	$7,500 – $15,000	$5,000 – $15,000	$2,500 – $7,500
Baggage Loss	$3,000 – $7,500	$3,000 – $7,500	$2,000 – $5,000

 

6. FWD travel insurance promotion

FWD is definitely one of the affordable brands and their prices are often competitive with ongoing promos. Always use MoneySmart’s travel insurance comparison page to get the best rates!

There is an ongoing FWD travel insurance promotion that gives you 30% discount off your travel insurance premiums from now till 19 May 2025when you apply the promo code MSTRIP. On top of that, you’ll walk away with over S$60 worth of rewards including:

• $15 Revolut cash reward
• 3 month Revolut premium plan (worth $29.70)
• Eskimo Global 1GB eSIM (worth $9.50)
• $10 Trip.com Coupon with every policy purchased

Plus, score a $100 Revolut cash reward in our giveaway on top of the baseline rewards above.

Valid till 19 May 2025.

 

7. FWD travel insurance emergency hotline and claim process

FWD emergency hotline: +65 6322 2072

FWD Online claims: Fill in this FWD claim form online and upload the supporting documents online.

Things to note: Claims must be made within 30 days of the event or incident. Refer to FWD’s claims guide for what documents to submit for each type of claim. FWD will follow up to acknowledge your claim within 2 working days.

 

8. Conclusion: Should I get FWD Travel Insurance?

In general, the FWD travel insurance plans are good value for money, especially for Asia and Worldwide.

One of the best things about FWD travel insurance is that they automatically cover activities like scuba diving, rock climbing and skydiving.

It’s particularly useful for those planning to go for outdoor activities like skydiving and hot-air balloon rides—unlike some other insurance companies that claim to protect you on your travels, but sneakily classify all your planned activities as “dangerous” and therefore excluded.

Another boon is the good trip cancellation coverage. (Because the world is full of threats to your imminent holiday.) FWD Premium has an above-average benefit for trip cancellations, even if it’s due to a Zika outbreak or haze.

Maybe I have the attention span of a millennial, but when I buy insurance from FWD I don’t find it horribly tedious. I appreciate that the whole user experience is mobile-optimised, fast and relatively painless.

If we just look at the numbers, there isn’t a lot to dislike about FWD travel insurance. Who wouldn’t be happy with good coverage at an affordable price—even after you add the COVID-19 rider? The one negative thing I’ve heard about FWD travel insurance is that claims can be slow or inadequate for some of my friends. But then again, I also have a good number of friends who reported a speedy, seamless claim process.

 

Still looking to buy travel insurance? Compare all the best travel insurance in Singapore.