A full-time virtual medical assistant costs $10.95 an hour through DocVA in 2026, or $22,776 for 2,080 hours a year. The in-house medical assistant covering that same desk costs a practice $63,783. Published rates across the category run $9.50 to $14.97 an hour, so rate settles a smaller part of the decision than most practices expect.
We joined federal wage and benefit releases to 2026 practice survey data and to the rates providers print on their own pricing pages. Every figure traces to the page that published it, and we left out anything we could not verify. What follows prices the in-house seat your practice already funds against the virtual alternative, then counts the costs that never reach a wage line.
Key Takeaways
- Employer benefits add 39.6% on top of wages in health care, lifting a $45,690 medical assistant into a $63,783 seat.
- A DocVA virtual medical assistant costs $22,776 for 2,080 hours, saving $41,007 a year on that same medical assistant seat.
- Published virtual medical assistant rates run $9.50 to $14.97 an hour, a spread of $11,375 a year on one full-time seat.
- 56% of practices report that medical assistant hiring got harder over the past year, and a 39-day vacancy costs $6,815 before a replacement starts.
What Clinical and Front Office Support Costs in 2026
Your practice tracks the wage it pays a medical assistant every payroll cycle. That wage line understates the seat, because employer benefits in health care add close to 40 cents to every wage dollar. Our data indicates the 2026 baseline below.
| Cost benchmark | Figure |
|---|---|
| Median annual wage, medical assistants | $45,690 |
| Median annual wage, medical secretaries | $45,930 |
| Median annual wage, receptionists | $38,010 |
| Median annual wage, medical records specialists | $51,140 |
| Employer benefit cost, health care industry | $13.73 an hour, 28.4% of compensation |
| Benefit load on top of wages (calculated) | 39.6% |
| Fully loaded annual cost, one medical assistant (calculated) | $63,783 |
Key Insights:
- Benefits push a medical assistant $18,093 past the wage line, so a salary comparison understates the seat by nearly 40%.
- Every $1.00 of wage costs your practice $1.40, which puts a four-seat front office budgeted at wages roughly $72,000 short.
The In-House Seat Against a Virtual Medical Assistant
Practices usually weigh one hourly rate against another, and that comparison hides the benefit load sitting on the in-house side. Matching both at 2,080 hours exposes the real gap, as the table below shows.
| Seat | Fully loaded in-house cost (calculated) | DocVA at $10.95, 2,080 hours | Annual difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Medical assistant | $63,783 | $22,776 | $41,007 lower, 64% |
| Medical secretary | $64,118 | $22,776 | $41,342 lower, 64% |
| Receptionist and front desk | $53,062 | $22,776 | $30,286 lower, 57% |
| Medical records specialist | $71,391 | $22,776 | $48,615 lower, 68% |
Key Insights:
- Records and documentation work opens the widest gap at 68%, so scoping that desk first captures the largest savings.
- A front desk seat still returns $30,286 a year, which funds most of a second assistant at the same rate.
What Providers Publish for a Full-Time Seat
Rate transparency separates this category more than credentials do, because several providers quote only after a sales call. We priced every published figure at full time so the models compare, as our analysis below indicates.
| Provider and published model | Published rate | Annual cost, full time (calculated) |
|---|---|---|
| Hello Rache, flat hourly | $9.50 an hour | $19,760 |
| MEDVA, starting hourly | $10.00 an hour | $20,800 |
| DocVA, flat hourly | $10.95 an hour | $22,776 |
| Wishup, Prime VA monthly | $1,999 a month, $11.53 an hour | $23,988 |
| My Mountain Mover, Core VA biweekly | $947.50 biweekly, $11.84 an hour | $24,635 |
| My Mountain Mover, Expert VA biweekly | $1,197.50 biweekly, $14.97 an hour | $31,135 |
Key Insights:
- The published band spans $11,375 a year for one seat, and even the top still costs under half of a loaded in-house medical assistant.
- Period pricing hides the hourly rate, so you need to divide a biweekly or monthly quote before comparing offers.
Further Reading
About this Report
This report was created for DocVA.
Sources
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Medical Assistants
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Secretaries and Administrative Assistants
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Receptionists
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Medical Records Specialists
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employer Costs for Employee Compensation
- MGMA, Medical Assistant Hiring
- MGMA, Staff Turnover in 2026
- MGMA, Addressing Denials in the Revenue Cycle
- SHRM, Recruiting Benchmarking
- American Medical Association, Prior Authorization Physician Survey
- Hello Rache, Pricing
- MEDVA, Benefits of VAs
- My Mountain Mover, Pricing
- Wishup, Pricing
- DocVA, Virtual Medical Assistant
