Consumer telehealth · Male fertility
Fellow
Fellow (Fellow Health) is a male fertility company for mail-in CLIA semen analysis, post-vasectomy testing, and optional sperm cryopreservation. Patients or clinic partners order a kit, collect at home, and ship to Fellow's lab. A DTC shop runs at meetfellow.com alongside a large clinical-partner channel. It is not a donor sperm bank and not provider clinic software.
Strong fit
- Men who want a mail-in CLIA semen analysis, post-vasectomy test, or analysis plus cryopreservation without a clinic collection-room visit
- Patients referred by a fertility clinic or urology practice that already uses Fellow as a lab partner
- Buyers who will use the published kit prices on meetfellow.com and confirm whether Progyny or other fertility benefits cover the analysis
Weak fit
- Anyone shopping a donor sperm bank or anonymous donor catalog - Fellow freezes and stores a patient's own sample for use with a sexually intimate partner
- Patients who need in-person reproductive endocrinology or IVF as the primary care relationship
- Buyers looking for provider-side EHR, intake, or clinic SaaS
Bottom line
Fellow earns a Highly recommend as the closest scored peer to Legacy for mail-in semen analysis and sperm cryopreservation. Fellow Health markets CLIA lab analysis with peer-reviewed validation (Samplaski et al., Fertility and Sterility 2021), a large clinical-partner channel, and a direct shop at meetfellow.com. Published prices are unusually clear for the category: Semen Analysis $199, Semen Analysis plus Cryopreservation $199 plus $240 per year storage, and Vasectomy Test $149, with shipping both ways included. Outcomes for patients are completed analysis and preservation access more than audited live-birth series from stored samples. Public scale markers include roughly 300,000 tests, 3,000-plus clinical partners, and about $48M raised through a July 2025 Series B, with revenue estimates commonly in the $10-25M band under our preferred range and under the $500M hard cap. On our consumer-telehealth board, Fellow scores above Legacy on analysis volume and published clinical validation, with cryo still an annual-storage product rather than a multi-year prepaid freeze bundle.
Score breakdown
Weights: Outcomes 35% · Product 30% · Implementation 20% · Pricing clarity 15%.
Fellow (Fellow Health) is a male fertility company built around mail-in CLIA semen analysis, post-vasectomy testing, and optional cryopreservation. Patients or clinic partners order a kit, collect at home, and ship to Fellow's lab. Results and storage sit on the same clinical path. A direct-to-consumer shop runs at meetfellow.com alongside a large provider-partner channel.
It is not a donor sperm bank and not provider clinic software. Compare Legacy for a similar at-home analysis and freeze stack with multi-year prepaid freeze bundles. Compare CryoChoice or Sppare.me when the primary need is freeze-and-store packages rather than a standalone fertility analysis kit.
Score reflects peer-reviewed mail-in validation, published kit pricing, and operating scale in tests and clinical partners, tempered by cryo economics that renew annually and by outcomes evidence that centers on completed analyses rather than large public live-birth series from stored samples.
Competitor landscape
| Vendor | Overall | Ease of use |
|---|---|---|
| Fellow | 8.3 | 8.0 |
| Legacy | 7.7 | 7.8 |
| CryoChoice | 7.2 | 6.5 |
| Sppare.me | 6.6 | 7.3 |
Pricing
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Model | Published mail-in kit prices with shipping both ways; cryopreservation adds an annual storage subscription per sample after a viable freeze. |
| What usually drives cost | Kit type (analysis only, analysis plus cryo, or vasectomy test), number of samples stored, annual storage renewals after the first freeze year, and whether fertility benefits cover the analysis. |
| What to ask in diligence | All-in cost for the kits and storage years you need, when the $240-per-year cryo subscription starts, and whether your plan or employer benefit covers testing in your state. |
| Published pricing | Public list price on meetfellow.com: Semen Analysis $199 (shipping both ways); Semen Analysis + Cryopreservation $199 + $240/year storage per sample; Vasectomy Test $149 (shipping both ways). Confirm live checkout totals. |
Fellow freezes a patient's own sperm for use with a sexually intimate partner. It is not a donor sperm bank. Confirm current kit contents and lab partners before checkout.
Prerequisites for purchase
| Need | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| What you need to get Fellow to function | |
| A clear reason to test or freeze (trying to conceive, post-vasectomy confirmation, or medical risk) | Vague shopping without a use case wastes kit spend. |
| Ability to collect a sample at home and ship it on the kit schedule | Missed ship windows invalidate samples. |
| Comfort that Fellow freezes your own sperm for use with a sexually intimate partner and is not a donor sperm bank | Wrong product category creates wrong expectations. |
| Budget for the published kit price and, if freezing, the $240-per-year storage subscription per sample | Cryo renewals matter after the first freeze year. |
| Willingness to review results and involve a clinician when trying to conceive or transferring samples | Lab numbers alone do not replace reproductive care. |
| What will maximize your value | |
| Match kit type (analysis, analysis plus cryo, or vasectomy test) to your actual need before checkout | Buying cryo storage you will not use, or skipping it when preservation is the goal, both waste money. |
| Ask whether insurance or employer fertility benefits cover the analysis in your state | Progyny and similar benefits can change out-of-pocket cost; storage fees often remain cash-pay. |
| If a clinic referred you, confirm whether that practice already uses Fellow as the lab partner | Partner workflows can change registration and results delivery. |
| Ship on the kit instructions and keep tracking until the lab receives the sample | Transit delays are the usual home-collection failure mode. |
| When you are ready to use frozen sperm, plan clinic transfer early with your fertility provider | Storage value appears when transfer logistics are already arranged. |
| Deal-breakers | |
| You need a donor sperm bank or anonymous donor catalog. | |
| You need in-person IVF or reproductive endocrinology as the primary care relationship. | |
| You cannot collect or ship a home sample on a fixed schedule. | |
| You are shopping provider EHR, intake, or clinic operations software. | |
| You will not read published kit prices and cryo renewal terms before paying. | |
Value creation time frame
| # | Stage | Typical range |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Order → kit arrives | Usually a few days for kit delivery |
| 2 | Collect → lab analysis results | Fellow markets clinically valid results within about two business days of lab receipt |
| 3 | Freeze decision → annual storage routine | Storage subscription starts when a sample is viable and cryopreserved; then renews yearly |
Methodology
| Weight | Factor | What it measures |
|---|---|---|
| 35% | Customer outcomes | Whether buyers get measurable operational or clinical-workflow results after go-live |
| 30% | Product | Capability depth, reliability, and fit for the job the category actually buys |
| 20% | Implementation | How hard it is to stand up, integrate, train, and stabilize |
| 15% | Pricing clarity | Whether a buyer can model total cost without a mystery quote |
| Label | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Highly recommend | Strong outcomes and product with manageable caveats |
| Recommend | Solid fit for the right buyer; know the tradeoffs |
| Conditional | Only with a specific use case or heavy caveats |
| Not recommended | Avoid for most buyers in this category |
Read our full methodology for how we weight scores and assign recommend labels.