John Hancock tied for third place in our 2025 Best Life Insurance Companies ranking, receiving 4.54 out of 5 stars. We analyzed the NAIC complaint index, AM Best scores, and surveyed customers.
Kara McGinley has over 6 years of experience writing, editing, and reporting on insurance and the insurance industry. She's been a licensed property and casualty expert in New York since 2021. Kara has been featured in several national publications, including USA TODAY, MSN, LifeHacker, Kiplinger, PropertyCasualty360, Policygenius, Rental Housing Journal, and WRAL.
Nupur Gambhir is an insurance expert and managing editor of Insure.com. She specializes in life and health insurance content, and has experience as a marketing consultant.
Why you can trust Insure.com
Quality Verified
At Insure.com, we are committed to providing the timely, accurate and expert information consumers need to make smart insurance decisions. All our content is written and reviewed by industry professionals and insurance experts. Our team carefully vets our rate data to ensure we only provide reliable and up-to-date insurance pricing. We follow the highest editorial standards. Our content is based solely on objective research and data gathering. We maintain strict editorial independence to ensure unbiased coverage of the insurance industry.
John Hancock tied for third place with New York Life in our 2025 Best Life Insurance Companies ranking, receiving 4.54 out of 5 stars. In our customer service survey, 87% of respondents said they were satisfied with the company, which is above average.
Credit-rating agency AM Best gave John Hancock a score of A+ (Superior), which is the second-highest a company can get. This indicates that John Hancock is a financially strong company. Of the customers we surveyed, around 97% reported that they plan to renew their policies. John Hancock also received some of the best survey scores for customer satisfaction in the billing process.
Below is our review of the full company and its line of life insurance products. It’s based on third-party metrics and an in-depth survey of insurance customers. Find the full methodology here, including an explanation of our survey scores.
AM Best's Financial Strength Rating is an independent opinion of an insurer's financial strength and ability to meet its ongoing insurance policy and contract obligations.
Of the customers surveyed, 87% say they’re satisfied with John Hancock. This is an above-average score in our analysis. However, John Hancock scored slightly below average in the J.D. Power customer satisfaction study, receiving 644 points out of 1,000. The industry average is 648.
John Hancock’s term life insurance policies cost more than the industry average of $377 per year. According to our analysis of rates, John Hancock charges an average of $415 a year for a 20-year term policy for a 35-year-old non-smoker with a $500,000 death benefit.
Customers need to easily access their policy documents and get service when it’s needed.
John Hancock ranks around average in this category, with 80% of customers saying they’re satisfied with the ease of service.
John Hancock scored above average in our survey, meaning most customers are satisfied with the insurer’s policy offerings. This is important because a wide range of offerings ensures policyholders get the specific coverage they need.
You want a company you can trust with your life insurance policy. In our survey, 90% of customers said they trust John Hancock. While this is a good score, several insurers scored higher with their customers.
Most John Hancock customers we surveyed plan to renew, with 97% responding as such. This indicates that customers are loyal to the company and satisfied with its services. However, a few insurers in our analysis scored 100%.
Note: The only state John Hancock is not available in is New York. Products and services vary by location.
John Hancock was founded in 1862, named after the founding father and patriot. The company, based in Boston, Massachusetts, has served customers nationwide for 160 years. In 2004, John Hancock merged with ManuLife, creating North America’s second-largest life insurance company at the time.
J.D. Power. “Individual Life Insurance Study.” Accessed March 2025.
Insure.com in the fall of 2024 surveyed more than 1,750 insurance consumers (973 people with life insurance). The survey was conducted by online market research company Slice MR.
Respondents were asked to name their life insurer and then grade it in the following categories:
The percentage of respondents who said they were satisfied or very satisfied with their insurer is presented in the results.
We then asked respondents to provide a yes or no response to indicate their agreement with the following statements:
The percentage of respondents who said yes is presented in the results.
The editors compiled the survey results and then selected – based on the number of survey responses – the top companies for further evaluation.
They then collected AM Best data, which measure financial strength, and National Association of Insurance Commissioners’ complaint data, which ranks a company by the number of customer complaints it receives. The Insure.com team identified the NAIC codes of each underwriting company for each carrier and calculated a weighted average complaint index, weighted by the annual written premium. The associated NAIC complaint index score was used in the calculations.They also collected insurance rate data from Compulife.
With the help of Prof. David Marlett, Ph.D., Managing Director of the Brantley Risk and Insurance Center at Appalachian State University, the editors created a rating system to determine which insurance companies were best in each sector. For life insurers, we took the following and gave each a weight.
Each insurer was awarded between half a star and 5 stars. No company in the ranking received less than half a star in any category, and 5 stars was the most any insurer could receive.