2025 LIMRA Industry Rankings: A Q&A with Nationwide’s Holly Snyder

Snyder: The overall industry growth is encouraging to witness, and that growth is across all product categories. It's not just one specific segment or category that is seeing success, which reflects strong customer demand and a healthy marketplace. It’s exciting to see that the industry grew at a record-breaking rate of ten percent – which means more Americans are reaping the benefits of life insurance. This growing demand means the industry is making headway in reducing a critical protection gap in our country.

Growth is increasingly going to carriers that have competitive products combined with simple, fast and transparent experiences for both advisors and clients. Advisors are looking beyond price to differentiate carriers, rewarding those that demonstrate consistency, long-term discipline, and reliability – especially in an environment where economic conditions and risk appetites continue to shift. That reinforces the importance of trust, stability, and execution over the life of the policy, not just at point of sale.

Snyder: In 2011, Nationwide was ranked 29th across the industry. Since then, we’ve deliberately expanded into key product categories—including IUL and linked-benefit LTC—and that strategic diversification has fundamentally shaped our growth over the years. We broke into the top ten a decade ago, reached the top five in 2023, and today we stand proudly in the No. 3 position in terms of total premium. What makes it even more meaningful is that we achieved the highest growth rate among all carriers in the top ten last year. It’s a validation of our strategy, our product innovation, and the trust our distribution partners place in us.

This is an important milestone because it reflects years of deliberate strategy, investment, and consistency. It validates that our approach of focusing on long-term value rather than short-term wins is resonating with advisors and customers alike. For us, this ranking isn’t just about scale. It’s about earning trust at scale. Life insurance is fundamentally about keeping promises over decades, and this milestone affirms that Nationwide is seen as a carrier that advisors can confidently build their business around and that policyholders can rely on for the long haul.

Snyder: Our momentum has been driven by a combination of diversification, discipline, and people. We’ve intentionally built a broad portfolio across protection needs from indexed and variable solutions to market-leading linked-benefit products, while still maintaining a strong risk framework and pricing discipline. We've invested heavily in modernizing our technology, simplifying the new business experience, and surrounding our partners with deep expertise and human support. Success in life insurance comes from combining innovation with care and never losing sight of the promises we make.

We’ve also focused on being transparent with our customers and partners. Transparency is the foundation of trust. We simplify life insurance to provide clear and reliable coverage our customers can rely on. No complications, no guesswork. Our commitment to transparency extends to premiums, costs, commissions – and how they work. We adhere to our pricing and underwriting standards, which have allowed us to maintain or even decrease cost of insurance (COI) rates and set stable COI charges to avoid the need to increase them later.

This commitment led to a 30% growth in the number of financial professionals actively selling Nationwide life products over the past three years.

Snyder: The life insurance market will continue to reward carriers that think long-term about how they manage risk and support customers throughout their lives. We expect continued demand for flexible protection solutions, paired with higher expectations for speed, transparency, and personalization.

I expect technology and automation to fundamentally reshape the insurance experience—from new business and underwriting, to claims and customer engagement. We’re also going to see continued momentum behind living benefit and hybrid life/long-term care solutions. Consumers want guaranteed, predictable value, and products that support them throughout their lifetime. That trend isn’t slowing down - if anything, it’s accelerating.

Snyder: My advice to advisors is to keep the focus where it belongs: on long-term outcomes for clients. Products matter, but so do the carrier behind them, the service model, and the commitment to stand by clients through changing needs and economic conditions. Partner with carriers that invest in simplicity, consistency, and human expertise. In a complex environment, advisors who lead with trust, education, and care will continue to differentiate themselves, and the right carrier partnerships can make all the difference.

The pace of innovation in our industry is only increasing, so it’s essential that advisors commit to continually learning about new and existing solutions that may meet the needs of their clients. Advisors need to understand more than just the pricing differences between carriers, but also the deeper distinctions — including product design, risk mechanics, service capabilities, and value-added benefits. The more they lean into understanding the nuances, the better they can guide clients to solutions that truly fit their needs.