Epic Vendor Services vs Open Epic: Costs and Tiers (2026)
CTO & Co-Founder
CTO & Co-Founder at Nirmitee.io. Architects healthcare integrations across FHIR, SMART on FHIR, ABDM and NHCX, writing from production experience taking hospital software from sandbox to go-live.
Epic Vendor Services is Epic's paid developer program. It starts at $1,900 a year and sits on top of open.epic, Epic's free developer site. Most teams can build and go live on open.epic alone. You need Vendor Services when your product needs technology that standard APIs do not cover, help from Epic staff, a Toolbox designation, or embedded testing. Our Epic integration services team helps you pick the path.
This page answers one question: should you pay, and when. For the full build path (routes, OAuth, write-back, timelines), read our guide on how to integrate with Epic. For the Showroom listing and review steps, read our Epic Showroom guide.
How do Epic Vendor Services and open.epic compare at a glance?
open.epic is free and enough for standard FHIR, HL7 v2 and SMART on FHIR work. Vendor Services costs from $1,900 a year and adds private technology, paid support hours, Toolbox and embedded testing. Your customer still licenses the APIs and approves your app, whichever path you pick.
| Question | Short answer |
|---|---|
| Who grants access? | open.epic: anyone can register. Vendor Services: "vendors that meet the basic enrollment criteria". Epic does not publish the criteria. |
| Who signs for production? | Each health system. Epic licenses its APIs to healthcare organizations, not to developers. |
| Public documents? | Yes for standard and public APIs. Private API, Kit, Clarity and Content Import specs are inside Vendor Services only. |
| Routes | FHIR, SMART on FHIR, CDS Hooks, HL7 v2, X12 on both. Private APIs, Kit and Clarity on Vendor Services. |
| Cost to you | open.epic: none. Vendor Services: from $1,900 a year, plus support billed hourly. Connection Hub: $500 per product per year. |
| Time | Enrollment: terms can be signed 48 hours after you download the Program Details. Epic does not publish approval or go-live times. |
| Biggest limit | Paying Epic does not get you a customer. Every health system licenses, builds, tests and switches on your app itself. |
Which companies need Epic Vendor Services, and which can stay on open.epic?
Most digital health startups and patient apps can stay on free open.epic. AI scribes, revenue cycle vendors and analytics firms often move to Vendor Services, because their best integration uses Toolbox, Kit, Clarity or private APIs. Consultancies have a separate gate: a consultant access agreement with Epic for each customer.
Each scenario below says what each tier gives that company, and a build time. Build times are our estimates for the engineering work only, kept to the low side. Customer approval time comes on top, and Epic does not publish it.
1Digital health startup: a patient or clinician app on standard FHIRLow
Who it is for: Patient apps, telehealth, remote monitoring, care navigation
The value: Read records and write simple data back through public APIs, with no Epic fee to you.
What each tier gives: open.epic gives the sandbox, client ID and public specs. Vendor Services adds nothing you need for read-mostly FHIR. Remote Patient Monitoring with Devices is a Toolbox category, so a device maker may want Vendor Services later.
Build complexity: Low
Typical build estimate (lower side): 4 to 6 weeks for a SMART on FHIR app on the sandbox (our estimate).
2AI scribe: ambient notes into the chartMedium
Who it is for: Ambient documentation and AI scribe companies
The value: Notes drafted from the visit land where the clinician signs them.
What each tier gives: open.epic covers a SMART app that reads context and writes notes through FHIR. Ambient Voice Recognition is a Toolbox category. Building to Epic's Blueprint for it needs Vendor Services and Epic's approval.
Build complexity: Medium
Typical build estimate (lower side): 8 to 12 weeks for the standard FHIR path (our estimate). The Toolbox path adds Toolbox Readiness, with no published time.
3RCM vendor: coding, CDI and paymentsMedium
Who it is for: Revenue cycle, coding, CDI and payment companies
The value: Codes, queries and payments flow into Epic billing without rekeying.
What each tier gives: HL7 v2 and X12 specs are public on open.epic. Fully Autonomous Coding, Encoder, Clinical Documentation Improvement and Embedded Payment Processor are Toolbox categories, which need Vendor Services. Private APIs, where standards fall short, are in the Vendor Services catalog.
Build complexity: Medium
Typical build estimate (lower side): 8 to 12 weeks per interface set (our estimate).
4Consultancy: services to a hospital that runs EpicMedium
Who it is for: IT consultancies, staffing firms, report writers
The value: Your people can work in the customer's Epic and use Epic's documents legally.
What each tier gives: Logging in to a customer's Epic or using Epic material needs a consultant access agreement, filed once per Epic customer. Clarity documentation sits in Vendor Services. Whether Vendor Services covers report writing for one hospital, Epic does not say, so ask in writing.
Build complexity: Medium
Typical build estimate (lower side): Access approval has no published time. File early, Epic advises.
5Analytics or AI vendor: models on Epic dataHigh
Who it is for: Population health, quality, AI and analytics vendors
The value: Bulk clinical, operational and financial data for models and dashboards.
What each tier gives: Kit, in Vendor Services, connects apps to customers' reporting databases and Caboodle. Epic documents that you can license Kit or Clarity through Vendor Services and write the SQL yourself, or rely on each customer's BI team.
Build complexity: High
Typical build estimate (lower side): 6 to 10 weeks for a first extract to your warehouse (our estimate), per customer environment.
What does each Epic developer tier give you: open.epic, Vendor Services, Connection Hub, Toolbox?
open.epic gives free public specs, a FHIR sandbox, client IDs and guidance. Vendor Services adds private specs, paid Epic support and expanded testing. Connection Hub is a $500-a-year Showroom listing for products with one live Epic customer. Toolbox is a Showroom designation in set categories, and it requires Vendor Services.
| Feature | open.epic | Vendor Services | Showroom: Connection Hub | Showroom: Toolbox |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Who can join | Anyone | Vendors that meet Epic's enrollment criteria | Any product in production with at least one Epic customer | Products in a Toolbox category, at Epic's discretion |
| Fee | None | From $1,900 a year | $500 per product per year, non-refundable | Not published. Needs Vendor Services |
| Standard and public APIs | Yes | Yes | Not applicable | Built to Epic's Blueprint for the category |
| Private APIs, Kit, Clarity, Content Imports | No | Specs and docs | No | Where the Blueprint uses them |
| Support from Epic staff | Forms and guides only | Epic TS representatives, invoiced hourly | No | Through Vendor Services |
| Testing | Launchpad, FHIR Developer Sandbox, Hyperdrive Client Test Harness | Expanded tools and environments with configurable test data | No | Toolbox Readiness before designation |
| Public listing | Client ID search only | Client ID search only | Yes, on Showroom | Yes, with a Toolbox label |
Showroom also has two tiers you cannot buy into: Cornerstone Partners, for technology integral to Epic, and Toolbox Under Construction, for Toolbox categories whose practices are still being written. Epic's public tier list, read on November 14, 2026, does not include a tier called Workshop. If someone quotes you a Workshop program, ask Epic for its terms in writing.
App Orchard and App Market are gone. Epic opened Connection Hub on January 9, 2023 and moved App Market vendors into Vendor Services.
When must you move from open.epic to paid Epic Vendor Services?
Move to Vendor Services when one of four things is true. Standard APIs do not cover your use case. You want Epic staff to review your design or debug with you. You want a Toolbox designation. You must test embedded in Hyperspace, MyChart or Epic's mobile apps. If none is true, open.epic is enough.
Start with the free Technology Guidance form on open.epic. Epic uses it to list the technologies that fit your use case. If a private technology fits, Epic tells you how to license it through Vendor Services. For a few of the most complex technologies, Epic also requires a customer to express interest in your product first.
What exactly does the $1,900 Epic Vendor Services membership include?
The membership gives you the expanded specification catalog, testing tools, tutorials, a developer forum and the right to open support tickets. Epic staff time is billed on top at an hourly rate. Expanded test environments with configurable data are also requested as a paid support service. The $1,900 is a starting price.
| Item | What Epic says it covers | Paid on top? |
|---|---|---|
| Sandbox and testing | Try-it cases against an Epic-hosted non-production sandbox, the Hyperspace Simulator for seven workflows including SMART on FHIR and CDS Hooks, and the Hyperdrive testing harness | Expanded environments with configurable data are requested as a support service |
| Embedded testing | Inside Epic's iOS and Android apps, a public MyChart instance, and Hyperspace, each with your Epic representative's help | Needs an Epic representative, so expect support hours |
| Documentation | Specs for private APIs, Kit, Clarity and Content Imports, plus a self-service Private API Catalog | No, part of membership |
| Data models | Kit connects apps to health systems' reporting databases. Clarity documentation is in the catalog | Licensing terms are not published |
| Design help | Integration design feedback and workflow expertise from Vendor Services TS | Yes, hourly |
| Install help | Install assistance and deployment tools | Yes, hourly |
| Learning | Tutorials, documentation, Developer Forum, Sherlock tickets | Tickets draw on paid support |
Epic gives a three-month trial. If you cancel in the first three months, Epic refunds the annual fee less any support you used or other amounts owed. Write down what you need to prove before you join, and test it in those three months.
To enroll, fill in the "I'm Interested" form on vendorservices.epic.com. Your account is created at once as a provisional account. You can agree to the terms 48 hours after you download the Program Details. The company enrolls once, and your admin user adds your staff.
Can a consultancy use an Epic Vendor Services license to write Clarity or Caboodle queries a hospital runs?
Partly. Epic documents that a vendor can license Kit or Clarity through Vendor Services and write the SQL that connects to customer environments. Epic separately requires a consultant access agreement when your staff log in to a customer's Epic, view Epic screens or use Epic material. Whether one covers the other, Epic does not say.
What Epic states, read on November 14, 2026:
- Clarity documentation is one of the "additional technologies" in Vendor Services. It is not on open.epic.
- For data extraction, Epic describes two options. The customer's own business intelligence developers write the queries, and their timelines vary a lot. Or you "take on the report complexity", license Kit or Clarity through Vendor Services, and write the SQL query to connect to customer environments.
- Kit lets vendors build analytics on Epic's Caboodle data warehouse.
- Anyone who is not an employee, medical staff member or student of an Epic customer needs an agreement with Epic to log in to that customer's system or use Epic intellectual property. Each firm files one Application for Access per Epic customer, through Epic's Consultant Relations team.
What Epic does not state: the price of a Kit or Clarity license, whether a Vendor Services license lets a services firm write queries for one hospital's internal reporting, and whether a firm may reuse its queries across clients. Ask Vendor Services and Consultant Relations those three questions in writing before you price the work. Our Clarity and Caboodle warehouse guide lists the questions to settle with the hospital, and our Caboodle guide covers the data model itself.
Does an Epic integration carry over to the next health system?
Your code, app record, client ID, Vendor Services membership and Connection Hub listing carry over. The customer side does not. Each health system licenses the APIs for its own production instance, builds and tests your app, and switches it on. Consultants file a new access request for every customer.
Epic's own advice on implementation is to stay flexible with each new integration, "even if you have an existing integration design that has worked for other organizations". Three groups take part at each site: the customer's operations leads, the customer's IT team, and Epic's technical staff, who support the customer's IT team as needed.
The customer's security review is its own decision. Our Epic vendor security review guide lists the evidence most health systems ask for.
How does Epic Vendor Services onboarding work, step by step?
Register on fhir.epic.com and build on the free sandbox. Send the Technology Guidance form. If Epic points you to private technology, fill in the "I'm Interested" form, wait 48 hours, agree the terms and pay. Then each customer licenses, builds and activates your app. List on Connection Hub after the first one goes live.
How much does Epic Vendor Services cost, and who pays which Epic fee?
You pay Epic only for optional programs: Vendor Services from $1,900 a year, hourly support, and $500 per product per year for Connection Hub. The health system pays Epic for the APIs, per production instance per year. The full USCDI FHIR API subscription has a set yearly price for each of five size tiers, from $4,500 to $47,000.
| Fee | Who pays | Amount | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| open.epic | Developer | None | open.epic Developer Support |
| Vendor Services membership | Developer | Starts at $1,900 a year. Full pricing shown after login | Vendor Services FAQ |
| Epic support hours | Developer | Hourly. Rate not published | open.epic Developer Support |
| Connection Hub listing | Developer | $500 per product per year, non-refundable | Epic on FHIR listing guide |
| Kit or Clarity license | Developer, through Vendor Services | Not published | Epic on FHIR |
| USCDI FHIR APIs | Health system | Set yearly price per production instance by tier: $4,500 to $47,000. Single APIs a la carte from $300 | Epic cost disclosure, Oct 15, 2026 |
How much does a health system pay Epic for FHIR APIs?
A health system pays Epic a yearly USCDI FHIR API subscription for each production instance, priced by tier from $4,500 to $47,000 in Epic's October 15, 2026 cost disclosure. Customers that need only a few APIs can buy them a la carte from $300, capped at the full subscription price for that tier.
Epic's cost disclosure, dated October 15, 2026, sets the tier for each production instance by its size. The full USCDI subscription has one price per tier. Customers that need only a few APIs can buy them a la carte, and the a la carte total per instance is capped at the full subscription price for that tier.
| Tier | Care organizations (concurrent users) | Payers, ACOs, CINs (members or patients) | Full USCDI FHIR subscription per year | One Level 1 API a la carte per year |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | 500 or fewer | 50,000 or fewer | $4,500 | $300 |
| 1 | 501 to 1,500 | 50,001 to 200,000 | $8,500 | $500 |
| 2 | 1,501 to 4,000 | 200,001 to 500,000 | $16,000 | $900 |
| 3 | 4,001 to 10,000 | 500,001 to 2,000,000 | $29,000 | $1,700 |
| 4 | More than 10,000 | More than 2,000,000 | $47,000 | $2,750 |
Level 2 APIs and API groups cost more a la carte. Each API's level is shown on its specification on fhir.epic.com. An instance used by both a payer and a care organization takes the care organization column.
Epic also asks app developers to state the total cost of an app to the customer accurately, including any extra licenses your app triggers. Ask for API scopes you need and no more. Epic notes that broad scopes can make an app look more expensive to switch on than it is. For a full build budget, see our Epic integration cost page.
What edge cases change the Epic Vendor Services decision?
These five cases change what you pay or which form you file: you are already live over HL7 v2 with no app record. Your Toolbox category is closing. You are a hospital building in-house. You need only one customer's data, or you cancel late in the trial.
- Live over interfaces, no app record. Epic lets you request a Connection Hub listing anyway. Create an app record, pick only the "Backend Systems" user type, and describe your interfaces.
- Closing Toolbox category. Epic says the Bayesian medication dosing and Outpatient Pharmacy Patient Locker categories will no longer be offered in 2027. Check the category list before you build to a Blueprint.
- You work for an Epic customer. Customer organizations get Vendor Services website accounts automatically, through UserWeb. You do not enroll as a vendor to build homegrown apps.
- Sandbox data. Epic's terms say sandboxes take sample or synthetic data only. Never load a customer's real patients for a demo.
- Trial refund. The refund drops by the support you used. Heavy support in month three makes the trial expensive to exit.
What can Epic Vendor Services not do for you?
Vendor Services does not sell your product, sign customers or approve your app at a health system. It does not replace the customer's API license. It does not certify you: Epic says it does not endorse or verify developers who use Epic on FHIR. A Connection Hub listing is marketing, not a requirement to install.
- No customer introductions are listed in what Vendor Services includes. You sell, price and invoice your product yourself.
- No guaranteed access to private technology. Some needs a customer to express interest first.
- No fixed approval time. Epic publishes no review or go-live times.
- No copying Epic's documents to clients. Epic's terms allow sharing only by linking to Epic's site.
- No Toolbox by payment alone. Entry is at Epic's discretion and needs Toolbox Readiness.
How long does it take to get on Epic Vendor Services and go live?
Enrollment can be quick: the account is created when you submit the form, and you can agree the terms 48 hours after downloading the Program Details. Epic warns it may take longer if it needs more from you. Go-live depends on each health system. Epic does not publish how long that takes.
For planning, our guide on how long an Epic integration takes breaks the work into phases. The build times in the scenarios above are engineering time only.
What should you ask Epic in writing before you join Vendor Services?
Ask Epic five questions in writing, because its public pages do not answer them: the license terms for consultancy Clarity work, reuse of queries across clients, the enrollment criteria, the hourly support rate, and approval times. Send them to Vendor Services and, for consultant questions, to Consultant Relations.
- Does a Vendor Services Kit or Clarity license let our firm write Clarity queries that one hospital runs for its own reporting?
- Can we reuse the same queries or extracts across several Epic customers?
- What are the basic enrollment criteria for Vendor Services, and does our company meet them?
- What is the current hourly rate for support services, and what is the full price list beyond the $1,900 starting price?
- How long do Technology Guidance replies, private technology access, Toolbox Readiness and Connection Hub listing approval usually take?
Summary: should you pay for Epic Vendor Services?
Pay for Vendor Services when a free path cannot do the job. That means private APIs, Kit or Clarity, Epic staff on your design, a Toolbox category, or embedded testing. Use the three-month trial to prove it. Budget hourly support on top, and plan every health system as its own project.
Sources
All read on November 14, 2026.
- Epic, open.epic Developer Support, comparison table, checked November 14, 2026
- Epic, Vendor Services FAQ (price, trial, enrollment, testing tools, Showroom tiers), checked November 14, 2026
- Epic, Requesting a Listing on Showroom (Connection Hub fee, Toolbox, categories), checked November 14, 2026
- Epic, Contact: Technology Guidance and Consultant Access, checked November 14, 2026
- Epic, open.epic Terms of Use, last updated October 31, 2025, checked November 14, 2026
- Epic, ONC certification details including cost disclosures, dated October 15, 2026, checked November 14, 2026
- Epic, Epic launches Connection Hub, December 9, 2022, checked November 14, 2026
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Frequently Asked Questions
How much does Epic Vendor Services cost in 2026?
Is Open Epic (open.epic) free?
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