Best Term Insurance Plans for 1 Crore Coverage in 2025

Term coverage is essential. Everyone having dependents in the family requires adequate term cover. But a term plan is a commodity. All term plans offer the same benefit, a defined benefit paid out to the nominee when life assured passes away. There are 25 life insurance companies in India, each offering its own term insurance plan. 

How do you decide which term plan to buy? 

Best Term Insurance Plans in 2025 

Here’s a list of the best term plans in India in 2025.

1. Max Life Smart Term Plan
2. ICICI Pru iProtect Smart
3. HDFC Life Click 2 Protect Super

Let’s see what the top term insurance plans offer.

Picking the Best Term Insurance Plans

Before we start discussing each plan in detail, let us understand what made us shortlist these plans and our methodology to arrive at this list.

There is little differentiation among term plans in terms of coverage and product features. Moreover, your insurer ultimately makes the promise and settles your claim. It makes sense to prioritise insurer metrics over product features. 

Here are the insurer metrics that we considered while selecting and rating India’s best term plans. 

1. Business Track Record
2. Gross Premium Written
3. Claim Settlement Ratio
4. Volume of Claim Complaints

Let’s see how these life insurance companies are faring.

Before we look at each plan and its features in detail, let’s discuss why you need Rs. 1 Crore term cover.

Why Consider Rs. 1 Crore Term Cover?

If your family members depend on you for their financial needs, a term insurance cover is essential. But how much cover do you exactly need?

You must understand that it is not you who needs that money from your term insurance plan. It is your loved ones who would need it in case of your sudden and unfortunate demise. So, a good approach to calculate your term cover requirement would be to assess your family’s current and future financial needs and then arrive at an amount. 

If this seems very complicated, we have simplified this for you. Visit our term insurance calculator and provide a few basic details. 

And there you have it! Your recommended term insurance cover amount.

Now, let’s look at each of our top term insurance plans and their features in detail.

Axis Max Life Smart Term Plan Plus

Axis Max Life Insurance is a leading life insurance brand. The company boasts of settling 99.65% of all the Individual Death Claims that were received in FY24. This is the best in the industry. 

The insurer recently launched Smart Term Plan Plus, a term insurance plan that offers an array of features at a very affordable price. The plan includes benefits like death benefit, inbuilt terminal illness benefit, special exit value (zero cost plan) and cover continuance benefit. It comes in 7 variants and offers some add-ons to customise your cover.

• Critical Illness and Disability Rider: This is among the most extensive critical illness offerings by any life insurer  in India. It covers up to 64 critical illnesses and total permanent disability as well.
• Maternity Cover for Females Lives: Female insured lives have the option to choose maternity cover which protects against the risk of pregnancy related complications and the newborn against congenital anomalies.
• Cover Continuance Benefit: You can skip paying your premium for a year in case of any financial trouble and still enjoy the cover. You can do this twice in the entire policy term.
• Zero Cost Option: At a specified term in the policy, you can get all your premium paid back (Special Exit Value) if you do not wish to continue your term cover. This option comes at no extra cost making this policy a zero cost term insurance.
• Terminal Illness Benefit: If you are diagnosed with a terminal illness, you can get a part of the base sum insured while you are still alive. The remaining portion, if any, is paid to the family upon death. 
• Flexible Claim Payouts: Your family will have several payout options to choose from at the claim depending on the need; lump sum, monthly income or part lump sum and part monthly income.
• Price: The premiums charged by the company are very competitive and lowest among the top 3 plans in the market.

Drawbacks to Consider: The plan does not offer an option to increase cover amount in future. Joint life option is also missing. Axis Max Life Insurance is charging low premiums while aggressively underwriting term plans. This could lead to future problems if adverse claim experience emerges.

ICICI Pru iProtect Smart

iProtect Smart is a good term insurance plan offered by ICICI Prudential Life Insurance Co. Limited. It comes from the house of ICICI which is a very trusted and respected brand name in the Indian financial services sector.

The company boasts a claim settlement ratio of 98.7% in the FY ending March 2023 for both individual and group death claims. It also claims that its average claim settlement time for retail death claims from the receipt of last requirement is just 1.2 days. These are pretty impressive numbers to look at from the claim settlement perspective.\

This plan comes with a lot of features making it a great option as term insurance. Also the plan does not mandatorily require medical tests to be conducted for cover less than or equal to Rs. 1 Crore.

• Critical Illness Rider: This rider, if added, provides you cover against 34 listed critical illnesses. It is an accelerated benefit which means that once you avail this benefit, your base cover reduces by that amount.
• Accidental Death Benefit: You can also add accidental death benefit to get added protection against the risk of accidental death. This is an additional benefit and is paid over and above your basic sum insured.
• Waiver of Premium: This plan offers an in-built waiver of premium option. If you are diagnosed with a permanent disability due to an accident, you don’t have to pay your future premiums to keep the cover active.
• Terminal Illness Benefit: The plan comes with an in-built terminal illness benefit. The entire base cover is paid to you by your insurer while you are still alive in case you are diagnosed with a terminal illness. The base policy comes to an end once this benefit is paid to you.
• Flexible Claim Payouts: This is a good feature where you have the option to choose from 4 different death benefit payout options; lumpsum, monthly income, combination of lumpsum and monthly income, increasing monthly income. But you have to choose one option at the time of buying the policy and this option cannot be changed later.
• Top-Up Sum Assured: Your responsibilities and liabilities can change with time. This plan gives you the option to increase your cover under your existing policy on the occurrence of key life events such as marriage or child birth.
• Smart Exit Option (Zero Cost Option): You have the option to cancel your policy at a specified time in your policy and you will get all the premiums paid till date back. This option comes with no extra cost which makes it a zero or no cost term insurance plan. 
• Price: Premiums charged under ICICI Pru iProtect Smart are on the higher side vis-a-vis other such plans available in the market. 

Drawbacks to Consider: This plan is expensive for lower sum assured where the base cover is less than Rs. 2 Crore. The company’s underwriting process is also lengthy and cumbersome which can leave you frustrated.

HDFC Life Click2Protect Super

HDFC Life Click2Protect Super comes from the stable of HDFC, which is arguably the most trusted brand in the market. HDFC Life is one of the largest private life insurers in India, and the company follows good management practices. The company claimed to settle 99.54% of all the individual death claims in the last financial year, which is a great number. 

This plan offers extensive features and add-ons.

• Critical Illness Rider: This critical illness rider covers only 19 illnesses which are less when compared to the peers in the market. But the critical illness cover under this plan is an additional benefit and payment of critical illness benefit does not reduce the base cover.
• Accidental Disability Rider: If you opt for this rider, you can get a monthly income equal to 1% of basic cover in case of an accidental total permanent disability.
• Protect Plus Rider with Cancer Cover: This is a great rider which offers 3 benefits. A portion of rider benefit is paid in case of accidental death, partial or total disability due to an accident or on the diagnosis of cancer. The good part is that this is also an additional benefit and does not reduce your basis cover. 
• Waiver of Premium: There are 2 waiver of premium options. You will not have to pay your future premiums to keep your cover running in case of diagnosis of a critical illness or in case of occurrence of total and permanent disability. You can choose any one or both of these options at the start of your policy by paying an extra premium.
• Terminal Illness Benefit: Your policy will pay you your base cover amount up to a maximum of Rs. 2 Crore while you are still alive and diagnosed with a terminal illness. This is an accelerated benefit and will reduce your basic cover to the extent of benefit paid on being terminally ill. If the entire cover amount is paid at this point, your policy will end. 
• Flexible Claim Payouts: The policy offers flexible claim payout options; lumpsum, part lumpsum and part income or regular income. You can choose any of these options and the time of buying your policy. Even your family later can choose any of these options based on their needs.
• Spouse Cover: You have the option to cover your spouse under the same policy by paying an extra premium. 
• Top Up Sum Assured: This plan gives you the option to increase your cover under your existing policy on the occurrence of key life events such as marriage or child birth. But you have to choose this option at the start of the policy to activate the top up sum assured at a given event.
• Smart Exit Option (Zero Cost Option): You have the option to cancel your policy at a specified time in your policy and you will get all the premiums paid till date back. This option comes with no extra cost which makes it a zero or no cost term insurance plan. 
• Price: Premiums charged under HDFC Life Click2Protect Super are on the higher side vis-a-vis other such plans available in the market. 

Drawbacks to Consider: This plan is one of the most expensive plans in the market. The riders or add-ons available with this plan are not as good as its peers in the market.

5 Term Insurance Plans To Be Mentioned

Other than these 3, here are 5 other term insurance plans worthy of mention.

• Tata AIA Sampoorna Raksha Promise
• Bajaj Life eTouch II
• Aditya Birla Super Term Plan
• SBI Life Smart Shield Plus
• Canara HSBC Young Term Plan

Final Recommendation

Which term insurance plan should you choose?

Choose Axis Max Life Smart Term Plan Plus 

If you are looking for an affordable plan that offers decent features and add-ons with a good claim settlement record, this plan is a great fit. However, you will find more trusted and popular brands in the market. If that’s your priority, it’s better to look at alternatives.

Choose ICICI Pru iProtect Smart 

If brand name and rich-features are your priority, and you are willing to pay a higher premium, this plan is a good choice. is an expensive term insurance plan. However, it is important to understand that the insurer struggles with a relatively high volume of claim-related complaints.

Choose HDFC Life Click2Protect Super

For those who value top-tier brand trust and comprehensive cover options, this is a great choice despite its higher price. Ideal for those seeking joint life or spouse coverage under one umbrella. However, be prepared for a long and complex onboarding process.