What an autism assessment costs in Singapore

The first step is free, and most parents do not know it

Before any specialist is involved, there are seven nationally recommended childhood developmental screenings. Eligible Singaporean children receive full subsidies for all seven — a patient fee of S$0 at CHAS GP clinics. Eligible PR children can access them at polyclinics, for ages nought to six.

This is the cheapest and fastest way to turn “something feels off” into a documented concern that a doctor has seen. If you are at the stage of wondering whether to raise it with anyone, raise it here. It costs you nothing.

Why your referral route decides your bill

This is the part worth reading twice, because it is the one thing that quietly costs families thousands.

Subsidies at public Specialist Outpatient Clinics are not automatic for everyone who walks in. MOH states that citizens and PRs “who are referred from eligible referral sources are eligible” — and it names them: A&E, inpatient, day surgery, a subsidised specialist clinic, polyclinics, and CHAS GP clinics.

You do not need to apply for the subsidy. MOH is explicit: “No application is required. Subsidies will be automatically accorded based on your means-test status for each episode.”

How much subsidy you actually get

For Singapore Citizens the rate is means-tested on monthly per-capita household income — your household income divided by the number of people in it, including your children.

MOH figures for Specialist Outpatient Clinic subsidies, as of July 2026. Households with no income are assessed on the Annual Value of their home instead, which lands them somewhere in the same 30–70% range.

Note the floor: even a high-earning citizen household still receives 30%. There is no income level at which the subsidy disappears entirely.

So what does the public assessment actually cost?

Here we have to be straight with you: no public hospital publishes a fixed price for an autism assessment, and we are not going to invent one.

There is a reason for that, and it is not evasiveness. The assessment is not one fixed product. Some children need more sessions than others, different tests are used depending on what the paediatrician sees, and your subsidy tier changes the final number. KKH puts it this way: the timing and sessions, “including information about the charges”, are discussed with you.

What you can do is ask directly, once your referral is in and you have an appointment. Ask what the consultation and assessment will cost after subsidy, and whether further sessions are likely. Staff answer this question constantly — it is not rude to ask.

Private: faster, and fully out of pocket

No subsidy applies to private assessment. Most private clinics do not publish their fees at all, and the ones that do are not comparable to each other — one clinic’s “assessment” is a one-hour screen, another’s is nine hours of testing with a written report.

Rather than give you an average that describes nobody, here is one clinic that does publish, as a concrete reference point. As of July 2026, Spectrum Psychology lists:

That clinic splits payment in half — half at the intake session, half before the feedback session — and includes one hard and one soft copy of the report. Treat these as one real example, not as the going rate.

Can I use Medisave? No — and here is why

This comes up constantly, and the answer is a clean no. Medisave cannot be used for a developmental or autism assessment.

Medisave’s outpatient scope is a defined list: chronic-disease management, vaccinations, health screenings, CT and MRI scans, cancer treatment, renal dialysis, assisted conception and a handful of others. Diagnostic assessment for autism or developmental delay is not on that list.

If you have seen a blog post suggesting otherwise, it is out of date or simply wrong. Plan around the subsidy instead — that is the support that genuinely exists for this.

What comes after the assessment

Worth knowing while you budget, because the assessment is not the expensive part in the long run. Early intervention is separately means-tested and heavily subsidised: EIPIC fees for Singapore Citizen children run from S$5 to S$430 a month, again based on per-capita household income.

And you do not need a formal autism diagnosis to start. The trigger for early intervention is a paediatrician assessing your child as at risk of a developmental delay — public or private — who then recommends it to SG Enable. Our comparison of EIPIC, DS-Plus and DS-LS covers what each programme costs.