The Cost of Caregiving in Singapore
The cost of caregiving in Singapore is mostly invisible, because most of it is unpaid. The Duke-NUS TraCE study (2024) values unpaid care for Singaporeans aged 75 and over at about S$1.28 billion a year — roughly 11% of government health spending, and around 33 hours a week and S$15,959 a year for a typical primary carer. SMU's ROSA Singapore Life Panel finds about one in seven older adults (aged 48-79) provide unpaid care. This page reports each figure with its study, its year and its age basis attached — because the S$1.28 billion covers the 75-plus only and is not an all-ages national total.
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Last updated: September 2026
What the cost of caregiving in Singapore really is
The cost of caregiving in Singapore is easy to feel and hard to price, because most of it is unpaid and never appears on a bill. The most complete recent attempt to value it is the Duke-NUS Medical School TraCE study, published in 2024, which put the annual value of unpaid care for Singaporeans aged 75 and older at about S$1.28 billion — roughly 11% of what the government spends on health. On the study's figures a primary carer gives about 33 hours a week and absorbs around S$15,959 a year in value. Read that number with its boundary attached: the TraCE valuation covers care provided to people aged 75 and over only. It is not an all-ages national total, so it cannot be lined up against Australia's or New Zealand's whole-country caregiving figures without double-counting the difference in scope. Where this page compares countries, it says so in the footnote.
The value of unpaid care — a 75-plus estimate, not an all-ages total
The headline "unpaid care is worth S$1.28 billion" is an imputation, not a payment. No one receives that sum. The method is the standard replacement-cost approach: take the hours carers report, price them at what it would cost to buy that care in the market, and total them. It is a legitimate way to show the scale of what families absorb, and it is not cash changing hands. It is also a 75-and-over estimate. Australia and New Zealand publish all-ages national totals on similar replacement-cost logic — New Zealand's unpaid care was valued at NZ$17.6 billion a year, about 5.4% of GDP (Infometrics for Carers NZ and partners, 2022); Australia's is put at an indicative A$77.9 billion a year (Deloitte Access Economics for Carers Australia, 2020 — a Tier-3 estimate we treat as indicative and keep out of our source list below). Those figures cover care to people of every age, so Singapore's S$1.28 billion — care to the 75-plus alone — is a narrower slice, not a smaller version of the same measure. The table below keeps the scope in view.
Unpaid-care valuations, with the age basis each one covers
| Country | Annual value | Age basis | Method | Source (year) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singapore | ~S$1.28 billion | Care to people aged 75+ only | Replacement-cost valuation | Duke-NUS TraCE (2024) |
| New Zealand | NZ$17.6 billion (≈ 5.4% of GDP) | All ages | Replacement-cost / economic-contribution | Infometrics for Carers NZ et al. (2022) |
| Australia (indicative) | ~A$77.9 billion | All ages | Replacement-cost valuation (2.2bn hours) | Deloitte Access Economics for Carers Australia (2020) — Tier-3, indicative |
These totals are NOT comparable row-to-row. Singapore's figure prices only the care received by people aged 75 and over; the Australian and New Zealand figures cover care to people of every age. They also use different years and different wage inputs, so read the age-basis column before reading the value column. The Australian A$77.9 billion figure is an indicative Tier-3 estimate (Deloitte Access Economics for Carers Australia) shown for context only; we keep it out of the source list below. New Zealand's NZ$17.6 billion is the Tier-1 comparator.
How many Singaporeans are caregivers
The count of caregivers is a different question from the value of their care, and it is measured by a different study in a different population. SMU's Centre for Research on Successful Ageing (ROSA), through its Singapore Life Panel, found in 2024 that about one in seven older Singaporean adults aged 48 to 79 provide unpaid care. That is a share of the 48-79 age band — not the same population as the TraCE valuation, which prices the care received by the 75-plus. The two figures describe two ends of the same relationship and should not be multiplied together. Behind both is a population ageing quickly. SingStat's Population Trends 2025 reports that 18.8% of Singapore's resident population is now aged 65 or older, up from 18.0% in 2024 and 11.8% in 2015, with an old-age support ratio of 3.3 working-age residents (aged 20-64) for every senior. And about one in ten residents aged 60 and over — roughly 88,000 people — live alone (Ministry of Health, citing the SingStat Census of Population 2020). Fewer working-age relatives per senior, and more seniors living on their own, is the arithmetic that pushes more care onto each caregiver.
What the state pays toward care — and what it doesn't
Some of a family's care cost is offset by the state, but the offsets are for formal care, not for the caregiver's own time. Two matter most. CareShield Life, administered by the CPF Board, pays a base benefit of S$689 a month in 2026, for life, to residents assessed with severe disability — a payout that helps meet care costs, not a cost itself. Separately, the Ministry of Health's means-tested long-term-care subsidy covers up to 80% of eligible fees for Citizens (50-55% for Permanent Residents), tiered by per-capita household income, under the enhanced rates that took effect on 1 October 2024. Neither of these reaches the number this page opened with. Subsidies and CareShield Life reduce what a household pays for nursing homes, day care and home-care services. They do not reimburse the 33 hours a week, or the roughly S$15,959 a year in value, that a primary family carer contributes unpaid. That gap between what the state offsets and what families still absorb is the whole reason the caregiving figure is as large as it is.
Figures we left out, and why
A few numbers that circulate in this subject are deliberately absent. A single nursing-home price. Gross fees at Singapore nursing homes are often quoted at roughly S$2,000 to S$4,500 a month before subsidies, but that is an indicative range aggregated across facilities, not an official published figure, and it varies widely by home and by care level. It is mentioned here only as an indicative range and is kept out of the sources list below. An all-ages Singapore caregiving total. There is no published whole-population equivalent of the AU and NZ national figures for Singapore; the S$1.28 billion TraCE estimate is the best available and covers the 75-plus only. We do not scale it up to all ages. A national loneliness headline. The often-quoted "two in five older Singaporeans are lonely" traces to a 2009 academic baseline, not a current government measure, so it is not used to frame a 2026 cost page. Where a figure appears above, its source and year are stated. Where they could not be, the figure is not here.
Where a free daily check-in fits — and where it doesn't
Nothing on this page is solved by an app. Unpaid hours, foregone income and the cost of formal care are policy and family-finance problems; the fixes for them are money, services and rest, not software. There is one narrow thing worth saying honestly on a page about cost. A large share of the daily strain caregivers describe is not a task at all — it is the background question of whether the person they care for is okay right now, running all day, on the days when nothing is wrong. A daily check-in answers that one question and nothing else: the person confirms they're okay, you see it, and if they don't, you're told. That replaces neither care nor money nor rest. It removes one recurring uncertainty from a load made of many, and the daily check-in itself is free — which, on a page about costs, is worth stating plainly rather than dressing up. If you are a caregiver in Singapore looking for real support, the Agency for Integrated Care (aic.sg) is the national first stop for caregiver information, respite options and subsidy help, and Caregivers Alliance Limited (cal.org.sg) runs free training and support groups for family caregivers. I'm Alive is a daily check-in app. You confirm you're okay once a day; if you don't, the trusted contacts you chose are notified. The daily check-in is free (the Check In plan, $0 forever) and works on iPhone and Android anywhere in the world, Singapore included. On the free Check In plan you name one emergency contact who is alerted if you go quiet, capped at one alert a month by push and email (no SMS); the one-time Stay Connected & Travel Safely upgrade ($4.99) keeps a single contact but lifts that cap to five alerts a month. Stay Protected (Premium, $29.99/year) and Complete Safety Net (Premium Plus, $39.99/year) allow up to ten contacts, unlimited alerts with full SMS escalation, and extra daily check-in windows — up to two a day on Stay Protected and three on Complete Safety Net, versus once a day on the free plan. Check-first phone fall detection is available on iPhone only, on Stay Protected and above; it stays off until you switch it on, runs only while the app is open, alerts your own contacts and never calls emergency services, and it is best-effort, not a medical device. There is no Android fall detection.
Sources
- Duke-NUS Medical School — TraCE study: the value of unpaid care for Singaporeans aged 75+ (~S$1.28bn/yr, ~33 hrs/week, ~S$15,959/yr per primary carer), 2024
- SMU Centre for Research on Successful Ageing (ROSA) — Singapore Life Panel: ~1 in 7 older adults (48-79) provide unpaid care, 2024
- Singapore Department of Statistics (SingStat) — Population Trends 2025 (18.8% aged 65+; old-age support ratio 3.3)
- Ministry of Health (Singapore) — higher long-term-care subsidies from 1 October 2024 (up to 80% for Citizens, 50-55% for PRs)
- CPF Board — CareShield Life (base payout S$689/month, 2026)
- Ministry of Health (Singapore), citing SingStat Census of Population 2020 — ~88,000 residents aged 60+ living alone
- Infometrics for Carers NZ and partners (incl. Ministry of Social Development) — the economic value of unpaid care in New Zealand (all-ages comparison: NZ$17.6bn/yr = 5.4% of GDP), 2022
Frequently Asked Questions
How much does caregiving cost families in Singapore?
The most complete recent estimate is the Duke-NUS TraCE study (2024), which valued unpaid care for Singaporeans aged 75 and over at about S$1.28 billion a year — roughly 11% of government health spending. On its figures a primary family carer gives about 33 hours a week and absorbs around S$15,959 a year in value. That valuation covers care to the 75-plus only; it is not an all-ages national total.
How many people in Singapore are unpaid caregivers?
SMU's ROSA Singapore Life Panel found in 2024 that about one in seven older Singaporean adults aged 48 to 79 provide unpaid care. That is a share of the 48-79 age band, measured separately from the Duke-NUS valuation of care received by people aged 75 and over, so the two figures should not be multiplied together.
Why isn't Singapore's caregiving figure comparable to Australia's or New Zealand's?
Because they cover different populations. Singapore's S$1.28 billion (Duke-NUS TraCE, 2024) prices only the care received by people aged 75 and over. New Zealand's NZ$17.6 billion (Infometrics, 2022) and Australia's indicative A$77.9 billion (Deloitte, 2020 — a Tier-3 estimate) value care to people of every age. They also use different years and wage inputs, so the totals are not smaller and larger versions of one measure — they are different measures.
Does the government cover the cost of caregiving in Singapore?
Only partly, and only for formal care. CareShield Life pays a base benefit of S$689 a month in 2026, for life, to residents assessed with severe disability (CPF Board), and the Ministry of Health's means-tested subsidy covers up to 80% of eligible long-term-care fees for Citizens (50-55% for PRs) since 1 October 2024. These reduce what a household pays for nursing homes and care services; they do not reimburse a family carer's own unpaid hours or foregone income.
What does a nursing home cost in Singapore?
Gross nursing-home fees are often quoted at roughly S$2,000 to S$4,500 a month before subsidies, but this is an indicative range aggregated across facilities rather than an official published figure, and it varies widely by home and care level. Means-tested subsidies (up to 80% for Citizens) and CareShield Life can reduce the amount a household actually pays.
What support is available for family caregivers in Singapore?
Singapore's national first stop is the Agency for Integrated Care (aic.sg), which points caregivers to information, respite options and subsidy help. Caregivers Alliance Limited (cal.org.sg) runs free training programmes and support groups for family caregivers. On the financial side, CareShield Life (CPF Board) and the Ministry of Health's means-tested long-term-care subsidies offset the cost of formal care, though neither reimburses a family carer's own unpaid hours.
Is the cost of caregiving in Singapore expected to rise?
The demographics point that way. SingStat's Population Trends 2025 reports 18.8% of residents are now aged 65 or older — up from 11.8% in 2015 — with an old-age support ratio of about 3.3 working-age residents per senior, and roughly 88,000 residents aged 60 and over live alone (MOH, citing the 2020 Census). Fewer working-age relatives per senior, and more seniors living on their own, tends to concentrate more unpaid care on each caregiver over time.
Can a check-in app reduce the cost of caregiving?
No, and we won't claim it does. Unpaid hours, foregone income and formal-care fees are policy and family-finance problems. What a daily check-in addresses is one narrow, recurring source of strain: not knowing whether the person you care for is okay right now. They confirm they're okay, you see it, and if they don't, you're told. The daily check-in is free.
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