Medicare Advantage

Before AEP: your St. Petersburg 2026 plan roster

Pinellas County has 101 Medicare Advantage plans for 2027. Compared with 2026, 29 plans are not coming back, 18 are new, and 30 continuing plans changed in some way you should check before December 7, 17 of them under a new name. This guide covers what those numbers mean for St. Petersburg, not which plan to pick.

If you live in St. Petersburg and are sorting through your Medicare choices for 2027, here is a plain-language guide to what is on the shelf. St. Petersburg sits in Pinellas County, and Medicare Advantage availability is set at the county level. For plan year 2027, Pinellas County has 101 Medicare Advantage plans from 17 carriers, according to the CMS Medicare Advantage Landscape Source File. The table below lists every one, with its plan type and whether it includes drug coverage.

What "Medicare Advantage" means in St. Petersburg

Medicare Advantage (Part C) is a way to get your Medicare benefits through a private plan approved by Medicare, instead of using Original Medicare directly. Most Medicare Advantage plans in Pinellas County bundle in Part D prescription drug coverage — in fact, every one of the 101 plans available for 2027 includes drug coverage.

Because plan participation is decided county by county, the roster is the same whether you live in downtown St. Petersburg, near Gulfport, or up by Feather Sound. What differs by person are things like your doctors, your medications and your budget — those you weigh against each individual plan's own documents.

The plan types you will see

Pinellas County's 129 plans fall into three network types:

• HMO (86 plans): You usually pick a primary care doctor and use the plan's network. Referrals may be required.
• HMO-POS (13 plans): A hybrid — mostly HMO, but with a "point of service" option to go out of network for certain services.
• PPO (30 plans): More flexibility to see out-of-network providers, typically at a higher cost share.

Seventy-two of the 129 plans are Special Needs Plans. SNPs are limited to people who meet specific criteria — for example, D-SNPs are for people who have both Medicare and Medicaid, C-SNPs are for people with certain chronic conditions like diabetes, heart disease, or end-stage renal disease, and I-SNPs are for people living in a qualifying institution such as a nursing home. If you do not qualify for an SNP, you cannot enroll in one.

Carriers offering Medicare Advantage in Pinellas County for 2027

Here is the carrier-by-carrier count, in alphabetical order. The table on this page lists every individual plan name, its type, and its drug-coverage status.

• Aetna (CVS Health): 10 plans (HMO, HMO-POS, PPO; 4 SNPs)
• Align Senior Care: 2 plans (HMO; 2 SNPs)
• American Health Advantage of Florida: 1 plan (HMO; 1 SNP)
• BayCare Health Plans: 3 plans (HMO)
• Blue Cross Blue Shield (HCSC): 3 plans (HMO; 2 SNPs)
• Centene (WellCare): 6 plans (HMO; 3 SNPs)
• Devoted Health: 10 plans (HMO, PPO; 5 SNPs)
• Elevance Health (Anthem): 22 plans (HMO; 16 SNPs)
• Florida Blue: 3 plans (PPO)
• Florida Blue HMO: 1 plan (HMO)
• Florida Complete Care: 3 plans (HMO, HMO-POS; 3 SNPs)
• Gold Kidney Health Plan: 4 plans (HMO-POS; 4 SNPs)
• Humana: 34 plans (HMO, PPO; 14 SNPs)
• Longevity Health Plan: 1 plan (HMO; 1 SNP)
• SECUR Health Plan: 3 plans (HMO; 3 SNPs)
• Solis Health Plans: 4 plans (HMO; 3 SNPs)
• Ultimate Health Plans: 5 plans (HMO; 4 SNPs)
• UnitedHealthcare: 14 plans (HMO-POS, PPO; 7 SNPs)

Some carriers, like Humana and Elevance Health (Anthem), offer a wide slate that includes both general and SNP plans. Others, like BayCare Health Plans or Florida Blue HMO, run a smaller, more focused lineup. The number of plans a carrier offers doesn't tell you which one fits you — that comes down to your doctors, drugs and personal preferences.

A few named examples so you can find yourself in the list

Every plan is in the table on this page. To make it easier to browse, here are examples across different plan shapes so you can see the naming patterns:

• General HMO plans include names like BayCarePlus Complete (HMO), HealthSpring Preferred (HMO), Simply More (HMO), CareAccess (HMO), Premier by Ultimate (HMO), and BlueMedicare Premier (HMO).
• PPO options include Aetna Medicare Signature (PPO), DEVOTED CHOICE GIVEBACK 008 FL (PPO), several HumanaChoice Florida (PPO) plans, BlueMedicare Select (PPO), and AARP Medicare Advantage from UHC FL-0019 (PPO).
• Special Needs Plans include D-SNPs such as Aetna Medicare Dual Select (HMO D-SNP), Wellcare Dual Reserve (HMO D-SNP), Humana Dual Integrated (HMO D-SNP), and Simply Complete (HMO D-SNP); C-SNPs such as Humana Gold Plus – Diabetes and Heart (HMO C-SNP) and Gold Dialysis & Kidney (HMO-POS C-SNP); and I-SNPs such as Longevity Health Plan (HMO I-SNP) and SECUR Advantage (HMO I-SNP).

Again, the full county roster — every plan name, type, and drug-coverage status — is in the table below.

How to decide, without getting overwhelmed

With 129 options, the trick is to narrow before you compare. A few questions that tend to cut the field quickly:

1. Do my doctors take the plan? Call your primary care provider and any specialists and ask which 2027 Medicare Advantage plans they will be contracted with. 2. Are my prescriptions covered, and at what tier? Every plan on the Pinellas roster includes drug coverage, but formularies differ. Medicare's Plan Finder at medicare.gov lets you enter your drugs and pharmacies. 3. Do I qualify for an SNP? If you have Medicaid, a qualifying chronic condition, or live in a qualifying institution, you may have SNP options built for your situation. 4. Do I want the flexibility of a PPO or the simpler structure of an HMO? That's a lifestyle question as much as a cost question.

As you compare Part D coverage within any Medicare Advantage plan, a couple of program-wide facts are worth keeping in mind: the Part D out-of-pocket cap is $2,100 in 2026 and $2,400 in 2027, and the maximum Part D deductible a plan can charge is $615 in 2026 and $700 in 2027. The old coverage gap ("donut hole") has been gone since 2025. There is also a Medicare Prescription Payment Plan that lets you spread your drug costs across the year in monthly amounts, if that fits your budget better.

Key dates for 2027 coverage

• Oct. 15 – Dec. 7: Medicare Annual Enrollment. This is when most people join, switch or drop a Medicare Advantage or Part D plan for the following year.
• Jan. 1 – March 31: Medicare Advantage Open Enrollment. If you are already in a Medicare Advantage plan, you get one chance during this window to switch to another Medicare Advantage plan or return to Original Medicare (with a Part D plan if you need one).