UnitedHealthcare Behavioral Health Reimbursement Rates in Texas (2026)

UnitedHealthcare lists about three in four Texas therapists at $110.30 for a 60-minute session, about 9 percent below its national median of $121.33. Nine in ten Texas therapists with a higher rate get it through Headway, SonderMind or Alma.

Optum, UnitedHealthcare’s sister company, runs its behavioral health network and publishes one national rate file for it. We read the October 2026 copy and kept clinicians whose practice address in the federal NPPES registry is in Texas.

Which UnitedHealthcare Plans Do These Texas Rates Cover?

They cover Optum’s behavioral health network, which UnitedHealthcare names for only a small share of its Texas plans. UnitedHealthcare of Texas’s October 2026 disclosures name the file for 46 of its 831 plans, about 6 percent. For the rest, they list only UnitedHealthcare’s medical network files, which hold its rates for doctors and hospitals. In Illinois, where we read the three largest of those files, they list few therapists. UnitedHealthcare’s provider site says Optum handles behavioral health credentialing and contracting on its behalf, so a Texas therapist’s UnitedHealthcare rate is an Optum rate. Read these figures as Optum’s network rates, and ask which network a patient’s plan uses when you verify benefits.

Three more limits are worth knowing.

• Medicare Advantage and Medicaid are not included. The federal disclosure rule covers commercial plans only.
• Self-funded employer plans can differ. An employer plan that UnitedHealthcare only administers can use its own arrangements.
• A listed rate does not mean open appointments. It shows that Optum has a rate for a clinician, not that the clinician takes new UnitedHealthcare patients.

Within those limits, the file is broad. It lists 14,487 Texas behavioral health clinicians with a 90837 rate.

What Does UnitedHealthcare Pay Texas Clinicians for 90837, 90791 and 96130?

The table pools every Texas license type. We kept rates labeled negotiated and billed as professional claims, and counted each rate once per clinician, even when it appears under several contracts.

CPT Code	Description	Mean Negotiated Rate	Median Negotiated Rate	Min	Max	Unique NPI Count
90791	Psychiatric Diagnostic Evaluation	$144.92	$131.15	$75.00	$639.25	14,488
90837	Psychotherapy, 60 minutes	$123.82	$110.30	$74.50	$739.94	14,487
96130	Psychological Testing Evaluation, 1st hour	$118.97	$120.30	$84.98	$453.81	4,621

Rates extracted from the Optum behavioral health file in UnitedHealthcare’s October 2026 machine readable files.

The 90837 average of $123.82 sits above the median because psychologists, psychiatrists and platform contracts pay more than the standard therapist rate. About one Texas clinician in eight has more than one 90837 rate in the file, often a platform rate next to the standard one.

Does UnitedHealthcare Pay More in Houston or Dallas Than in the Rest of Texas?

No. The most common 90837 rate for Texas counselors, social workers and family therapists is $110.30 in every metro area we checked.

• Houston. 74 percent of therapists hold $110.30.
• Dallas and Fort Worth. 70 percent.
• Austin. 72 percent.
• San Antonio. 81 percent.
• El Paso. 69 percent.
• Rio Grande Valley. 85 percent.

That is different from California, where Optum’s most common rate moves up about 5 percent from the Inland Empire to Los Angeles and again to the Bay Area. In Texas, the gaps between therapists come from who holds the contract, not where the office is. We grouped clinicians by the ZIP code on their NPPES practice address, so treat metro boundaries as approximate.

Why Do Headway, SonderMind and Alma Therapists Have Higher UnitedHealthcare Rates?

Because each platform holds its own group contract with Optum, and each contract pays more than the standard $110.30. Together they cover about 30 percent of Texas therapists with a 90837 rate.

Platform	Share of Texas therapists	90837 rate	Above $110.30	90791 rate
Alma	5%	$144.40	31%	$144.40
Headway	20%	$137.78	25%	$163.38
SonderMind	10%	$127.32	15%	$130.90
No platform	70%	$110.30 (93% of them)		$131.15

We matched each platform by the tax ID its clinicians are listed under. Headway’s Texas clinicians are listed under New York Medical Behavioral Health Services, P.C., the group Headway names as its Texas billing entity. SonderMind’s are listed under SonderMind Provider Network and Alma’s under Alma Community Network.

Intake rates follow a different pattern. Headway’s 90791 is about 25 percent above the standard $131.15, but SonderMind’s is 25 cents below it.

These are the rates Optum pays each platform, not what the clinician takes home. That depends on each platform’s terms. Alma, for example, charges clinicians a monthly membership fee, according to its provider documents. Ask any platform what it pays you per session before comparing it with a direct contract.

About three in ten platform therapists also hold the standard $110.30 under another practice. For them, the payment depends on which practice bills the claim.

How Much More Does UnitedHealthcare Pay Texas Psychologists Than Counselors?

About a third more for a 60-minute session. Optum’s most common 90837 rate is $147.07 for Texas psychologists and $110.30 for counselors, social workers and family therapists.

• Psychologists. $147.07, held by 80 percent. The intake (90791) median is $174.86.
• Psychiatrists. $147.07, held by 70 percent. Many psychiatrists bill medication visits with other codes.
• Psychiatric nurse practitioners. $125.01, held by 82 percent, and $148.63 for the intake.
• Counselors, social workers and family therapists. $110.30 for therapy and $131.15 for the intake.

Platforms matter less for psychologists. Only 6 percent of Texas psychologists hold a platform rate, and Headway’s $156.16 is about 6 percent above the standard $147.07. Nurse practitioners gain more. Headway lists them at $156.16 and Alma at $185.65, against $125.01, but only 13 percent hold a platform rate.

Testing follows license too. Counselors with a 96130 rate are listed at $110.93 for the first hour, and psychologists at $120.30.

Does a Practice’s Own Optum Contract Beat the Standard Texas Rate?

For therapists, no. The 241 Texas therapists with a 90837 rate that Optum lists for just one practice have a median of $109.59, slightly below the standard $110.30.

Psychologists do a little better. The 124 with a one-practice rate have a median of $154.42, about 5 percent above the standard $147.07. Psychiatric nurse practitioners show the same 5 percent gap, $131.26 against $125.01, though only 34 hold such a rate.

The file does not show why a practice got its own rate or when. Treat these figures as what practices hold today, not as an offer Optum will make on request.

How Do Texas UnitedHealthcare Rates Compare With Other States?

Texas sits in the bottom half. Among the 35 states with at least 1,000 behavioral health clinicians in Optum’s national file, 19 have a higher 90837 median and 7 share Texas’s $110.30.

• Highest. Oregon, with a median of $189.06.
• Other large states. New York at $137.78, Florida at $125.01, California at $121.33 and Illinois at $118.75.
• Lowest. $104.79, shared by Oklahoma, Kansas, Kentucky, Indiana and Arkansas.

Headway’s Texas rate of $137.78 matches the New York median. A Texas therapist on Headway is listed at the rate of a typical New York clinician.

Does Texas Law Speed Up Credentialing With UnitedHealthcare?

Only for physicians, including psychiatrists, who join a group that already has a contract. Texas sets no comparable rule for counselors, social workers, family therapists or psychologists on commercial plans.

Under Insurance Code chapter 1452, subchapter C, a physician who joins a medical group with a plan contract is paid as in-network once the plan has their credentialing paperwork.

• During review. The plan pays at in-network rates and you can collect the in-network copay. The plan does not have to list you in its directory yet.
• If credentialing is denied. The plan can take back the difference between in-network and out-of-network payment from the physician or the group, not the patient. Copays already collected stay with the practice.

For other clinicians, Texas rules set a response deadline only for HMOs. Under 28 TAC 11.1402, an HMO must tell an applicant in writing within 90 days of receiving the application whether it accepts them. A denial must come with a written reason. Texas also does not require insurers to accept every willing provider.

State law reaches insured plans, not self-funded employer plans. Optum contracts on behalf of UnitedHealthcare plans, so if you are a psychiatrist joining a group, ask Optum in writing how it applies the chapter 1452 rule to your group’s agreement.

What This Means for Your Practice

For a Texas therapist, a platform is the main route to a UnitedHealthcare rate above $110.30. A direct agreement with Optum usually lists you at the standard rate, and therapists with their own practice rate do no better.

At 25 UnitedHealthcare sessions a week, here is how much more each platform rate brings in than the standard rate, before platform fees:

Platform	Extra per session	Extra per week
Alma	$34.10	$852.50
Headway	$27.48	$687.00
SonderMind	$17.02	$425.50

A direct contract has its own advantages. It is yours, so the rate stays with you if you leave a group or platform, and no platform takes a fee. For a psychologist, the case for a platform is weaker, because the standard rate is already $147.07 and Headway adds about 6 percent.

UnitedHealthcare also pays the least of the three large Texas commercial payers we have covered. For a 60-minute session, the medians are:

• UnitedHealthcare. $110.30 in its October 2026 file.
• Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas. $117.91 in its August 2026 files. See our Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas rates.
• Aetna. $130.22 in its September 2026 HMO files. See our Aetna Texas rates.

Our Texas therapy rates by payer compares the same clinicians across all three, license by license. Rank the payers on your own fee schedules and remittances, not these medians, and our guide to negotiating insurance contract rates covers asking for more.

Disclaimer: This article uses rate information from the Machine Readable Files that UnitedHealthcare publishes under the federal Transparency in Coverage rule. The Optum behavioral health file is small by these standards, about 80 megabytes unzipped, but it lists rates for more than 175,000 provider ID numbers nationwide with no names attached. Fuse built its own software to match those rates to clinicians and verify the figures above. This analysis covers a single payer and will not reflect rates from all available insurance options in Texas. Platform names identify the group contracts in the file and do not describe what any platform pays its clinicians. Healthcare pricing changes frequently, and individual circumstances affect actual payment. Practices should verify current rates directly with UnitedHealthcare before relying on them for billing or negotiation decisions.