The Fertility Shift: Why More Women Are Freezing Their Eggs and What You Need to Know

Picture this: you’re 32 years old. Your career is finally taking off after years of hard work. You’re not in a relationship, or maybe you are but you’re not ready for kids. Your biological clock? You’re aware it exists, but you’re not ready to make major life decisions based solely on your ovaries’ timeline. So you start wondering: should I freeze my eggs?

Welcome to the new normal. For the first time in U.S. history, more women are having babies in their thirties than in their twenties. The number of women freezing their eggs has skyrocketed—up 15 times from 2013 to 2018, and it’s continued climbing since then. What was once considered an extreme measure for women facing cancer treatment has become a routine part of family planning for many women who simply aren’t ready for kids yet.

But here’s what nobody tells you: egg freezing is expensive, emotionally intense, and definitely not a guarantee. It’s also offering women unprecedented control over their reproductive timelines. So how do you figure out if it’s right for you?

Why the Fertility Landscape Has Changed

Women today face a fundamentally different reproductive landscape than their mothers did. More women are pursuing advanced education and establishing careers before considering children. The average age of first-time mothers has been steadily increasing for decades—from 21 in 1970 to over 27 today, and it’s even higher for college-educated women.

This shift isn’t about women being selfish or career-obsessed, despite what certain cultural narratives suggest. It’s about economic reality. Housing costs have soared. Student debt is crushing. Many careers require years of training and early-career hustle before reaching stability. And finding the right partner takes time—or sometimes, doesn’t happen according to anyone’s timeline.

Meanwhile, one biological fact hasn’t changed: female fertility declines with age, particularly after 35. You’re born with all the eggs you’ll ever have, and both the quantity and quality decrease over time. By your mid-thirties, getting pregnant naturally becomes measurably harder. By your early forties, it’s quite difficult for many women.

This mismatch—between when women are ready for children and when their biology makes it easiest—is what’s driving the fertility revolution. And egg freezing is one of the most significant tools addressing this mismatch.

What Egg Freezing Actually Involves

Let’s demystify the process, because knowing what’s involved is essential for making an informed decision.

Step one is testing and consultation. Your doctor will check your ovarian reserve through blood tests (measuring AMH and FSH hormones) and an ultrasound to count your antral follicles. This gives you a sense of how many eggs you might be able to retrieve and helps determine if egg freezing is likely to be worthwhile for you.

Step two is ovarian stimulation. For about 10-14 days, you’ll give yourself daily hormone injections to stimulate your ovaries to produce multiple eggs instead of the single egg they’d normally release in one cycle. You’ll go in for monitoring appointments every few days to track how your follicles are developing.

These injections can have side effects—bloating, mood swings, breast tenderness, fatigue. Some women sail through with minimal issues; others find it quite uncomfortable. You’re basically putting your body through a controlled version of hyperovulation.

Step three is the egg retrieval. This is a surgical procedure done under sedation. Your doctor uses an ultrasound-guided needle to retrieve the mature eggs from your ovaries. The procedure takes about 20-30 minutes, and you’ll need someone to drive you home afterward. Most women feel crampy and bloated for a few days afterward, though some feel fine almost immediately.

Step four is the freezing. The retrieved eggs are flash-frozen using a process called vitrification, which prevents ice crystal formation that could damage the eggs. They’re then stored in liquid nitrogen at incredibly cold temperatures until you’re ready to use them.

The Numbers You Need to Know

Here’s the reality check nobody wants to hear, but you need to know: egg freezing doesn’t guarantee a baby.

Success rates depend heavily on your age when you freeze your eggs. Women under 35 typically retrieve more eggs and higher-quality eggs than women over 35. Generally, you need about 15-20 frozen eggs to have a good chance of eventually having one baby.

But one egg retrieval cycle might only yield 10-15 eggs, fewer if you’re older or have lower ovarian reserve. This means many women do multiple rounds of egg freezing to bank enough eggs to feel confident about their options.

When you eventually thaw and use frozen eggs, not all of them will survive the thawing process (typically about 75-85% do). Of those that survive, not all will fertilize successfully. Of those that fertilize, not all will develop into viable embryos. And of those embryos that look good, not all will result in a successful pregnancy.

The overall success rate—from frozen eggs to live birth—varies widely depending on age and other factors, but generally ranges from 30-60% per egg retrieval cycle for women under 35, and lower for older women.

This isn’t meant to discourage you—many women successfully have babies using frozen eggs. But it’s crucial to go into this with realistic expectations, not viewing egg freezing as an insurance policy that guarantees future fertility.

The Financial Reality

Let’s talk about what nobody wants to talk about: egg freezing is expensive, and insurance rarely covers it unless you have a medical condition requiring it.

A single cycle of egg freezing typically costs $10,000-$20,000 depending on your location and clinic. This includes the medications (which can run $3,000-$5,000 alone), monitoring appointments, the retrieval procedure, and the initial freezing. But it doesn’t include annual storage fees, which run $500-$1,000 per year.

If you need multiple cycles to retrieve enough eggs, multiply those costs. If you eventually use those eggs, you’ll need to pay for IVF, which costs another $12,000-$17,000 per cycle plus medications.

Some employers—particularly large tech companies and progressive corporations—now offer fertility benefits that include egg freezing coverage. Companies like Google, Facebook (Meta), Apple, and many others provide this as part of their benefits package. This is partly genuine support for employee reproductive choices, and partly an acknowledgment that recruiting and retaining talented women means offering benefits that help them manage their biological timelines.

If your employer doesn’t offer coverage, some clinics offer payment plans or discount programs. But the financial barrier remains very real for many women, making egg freezing a privilege accessible primarily to higher-income women.

Who Should Consider Egg Freezing?

So who are the ideal candidates for egg freezing? Generally, the following situations make someone a good candidate:

Women in their late twenties to mid-thirties who aren’t ready for children yet but want to preserve their current fertility. Your egg quality and quantity is better now than it will be in five years, and freezing eggs now gives you more and better options later.

Women facing medical treatments that could harm fertility, like certain cancer treatments. In these cases, insurance is more likely to cover egg freezing, and the medical urgency is clear.

Women with family histories of early menopause who may have a shorter fertility window than average. If your mother or sisters went through menopause in their early forties or late thirties, you might benefit from egg freezing earlier.

Women who have tested their ovarian reserve and found concerning results. If you’re only 30 but your AMH levels indicate low ovarian reserve, egg freezing sooner rather than later might be advisable.

Women who are single or in relationships where children aren’t on the immediate horizon but who definitely want kids someday. Egg freezing buys time to find the right partner or wait until the relationship is ready for parenthood.

Who might not be a good candidate? Women over 40 may retrieve fewer eggs of lower quality, making egg freezing less likely to be successful and potentially not worth the financial investment. Women with very low ovarian reserve might not retrieve enough eggs to make it worthwhile. And women who are actively trying to conceive or ready to start trying soon should probably just go ahead rather than freezing eggs.

The Emotional Roller Coaster

What often catches women off guard isn’t the physical process—it’s the emotional intensity. You’re confronting your fertility, your age, your life timeline, and your hopes for the future all at once. You’re making a huge financial investment in something uncertain. You’re giving yourself shots and dealing with hormone swings. And the outcome—the number of eggs retrieved—can feel like a referendum on your fertility and future.

Some women describe profound relief after freezing eggs—like they’ve regained control over their timeline and bought themselves psychological freedom to focus on other life goals without constant anxiety about their ticking biological clock.

Others feel conflicted. The process forces you to reckon with the reality that fertility isn’t unlimited, which can be emotionally difficult even when you intellectually knew it. Some women feel pressure—from family, from society, from themselves—about whether they’re making the “right” choice.

And here’s something rarely discussed: what if you freeze your eggs and never use them? Some women eventually conceive naturally, making their frozen eggs unnecessary. Others change their minds about having children, or circumstances change in ways that make the frozen eggs irrelevant. That substantial investment in time, money, and emotional energy can feel confusing in retrospect.

The key is processing these emotions—ideally with support from a therapist, fertility counselor, or at minimum trusted friends who understand what you’re going through.

The Partner Conversation

If you’re in a relationship, egg freezing can bring up complicated dynamics. Some partners are supportive. Others feel hurt, viewing it as a sign that you don’t see a future with them. Some worry about the financial cost. Others don’t understand why it’s necessary.

Clear communication is essential. Explain that egg freezing isn’t about not wanting children with them—it’s about preserving options in case circumstances change or if you discover fertility issues when you eventually try to conceive. Frame it as being proactive about family planning, not hedging bets on the relationship.

If you’re single and freezing eggs, there can be emotional complexity around that too. Some women feel empowered and independent. Others feel sad that they’re in this position, wishing they had a partner to build a family with now. Both feelings (and everything in between) are completely valid.

What About Fertility Tracking Instead?

With fertility awareness methods and cycle tracking apps becoming more sophisticated, some women wonder if tracking is a better option than egg freezing for understanding and preserving fertility.

Fertility awareness is valuable for understanding your cycle, identifying your fertile window if you’re trying to conceive, or even using as a non-hormonal birth control method (though it requires diligence and isn’t as reliable as other methods). Apps and wearables can now track basal body temperature, cervical mucus, and other fertility signals quite accurately.

But fertility tracking doesn’t preserve fertility—it just helps you understand your current status and optimize timing for conception. It won’t prevent the age-related decline in egg quality and quantity. If you’re 33 and not ready for kids for another five years, fertility tracking won’t change the fact that you’ll be 38 when you start trying.

The two approaches serve different purposes. Fertility tracking helps with family planning in the present. Egg freezing preserves options for the future. They’re complementary, not competing strategies.

Alternative and Emerging Options

Egg freezing gets the most attention, but other fertility preservation options exist:

Embryo freezing: If you have a partner, you can create embryos (fertilized eggs) and freeze those instead of unfertilized eggs. Embryos survive the freeze/thaw process better than eggs and have higher success rates. But this requires you to already have the partner you want to have children with, which isn’t always the case.

Ovarian tissue freezing: Still experimental but increasingly available, this involves surgically removing and freezing a piece of ovarian tissue that can later be transplanted back. This is primarily used for young women about to undergo cancer treatment, but research continues.

Fertility supplements and lifestyle: While they won’t replace egg freezing if you need to delay childbearing by years, certain lifestyle factors and supplements (CoQ10, vitamin D, inositol, healthy diet, regular exercise, avoiding smoking) can support egg quality.

Making the Decision

So how do you actually decide if egg freezing is right for you? Start by asking yourself some key questions:

How important is having biological children to you? If it’s non-negotiable, that weighs in favor of egg freezing. If you’re open to adoption or child-free life, that changes the calculation.

What’s your current age and expected timeline? If you’re 29 and not ready for kids for at least five years, egg freezing might make sense. If you’re 35 and hoping to start trying in a year or two, you might just wait.

What’s your financial situation? Can you comfortably afford the upfront costs without creating financial stress? Do you have employer coverage?

What’s your ovarian reserve? Testing can help answer whether egg freezing is likely to be successful for you.

How do you feel about medical procedures and intervention? Some women are comfortable with the medicalization of their fertility; others prefer to avoid it if possible.

What would you regret more—spending the money and never needing the eggs, or not freezing eggs and later struggling with infertility?

There’s no universal right answer. For some women, egg freezing provides peace of mind worth far more than its monetary cost. For others, the financial investment doesn’t feel justified by the uncertain benefit.

The Bottom Line

Egg freezing represents a significant shift in reproductive autonomy. For the first time, women have a tangible option for uncoupling their biological fertility timeline from their life circumstances timeline. That’s genuinely revolutionary, even if it comes with limitations, costs, and emotional complexity.

But it’s not a perfect solution, and it’s not for everyone. The technology is amazing, but it’s not magic. It works better for some women than others. It’s expensive and often inaccessible to women who might benefit from it most. And success is never guaranteed.

If you’re considering egg freezing, gather information, consult with fertility specialists, understand your specific situation and odds, consider the financial implications, and think deeply about what’s right for your life and goals.

And remember: whatever you decide—to freeze eggs, to try conceiving now, to pursue other family-building options, or to choose a child-free life—is valid. Your reproductive choices are deeply personal, and they don’t need to justify themselves to anyone else’s timeline or expectations.

The power to choose is the real revolution. How you use that power is entirely up to you.