- Free to use per third-party sources (registration may be required). The Medscape page itself states no price.
- Not disclosed
- Not disclosed
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- None stated. Listed as a reference for comparison.
Drug info
Medscape Drug Interaction Checker
by WebMD
Drug interaction lookup for prescription drugs, OTC medications, herbal supplements and some foods, with severity categories.
On this page
29/100Niche fit
- Regulatory & Compliance0/22
No FDA clearance listed
- Clinical Integration0/26
No EHR integrations listed
- Evidence Strength21/27
5 peer-reviewed papers
- Vendor & Market10.9/21.6
Mid-tier funding and adoption
- Sentiment & Transparency0/15
No clinician sentiment data available
▸ Show all 11 dimensions▾ Hide dimension detail
- FDA clearance0/12
No FDA clearance listed
- HIPAA / SOC2 / BAA0/10
No public HIPAA/SOC2/BAA attestation
- EHR integrations (count)0/14
No EHR integrations listed
- Top-3 EHR coverage (Epic / Oracle / Athena)0/8
None of the top-3 EHRs covered
- Bidirectional write-back0/4
No bidirectional write-back documented
- Peer-reviewed papers21/21
5 peer-reviewed papers
- RCT / meta-analysis / systematic review0/6
No RCT, meta-analysis, or systematic review
- Funding & adoption signal11/16
Mid-tier funding and adoption
- Years in market0/6
Founded year not recorded
- Clinician sentiment (Reddit)0/9
No clinician sentiment data available
- Pricing transparency0/6
No public pricing
Drug interaction lookup for prescription drugs, OTC medications, herbal supplements and some foods, with severity categories.
Free to use per third-party sources (registration may be required). The Medscape page itself states no price.
Bottom line
The Medscape Drug Interaction Checker is a free search tool for checking interactions between prescription drugs, over-the-counter drugs, herbal supplements and some foods. It is a searchable interaction database with severity categories. Research teams use it often as a screening instrument, and the accuracy studies that test it, from 2016 to 2020, place it behind Lexicomp and Micromedex. It fits a quick check at the point of prescribing, a pharmacy student or a researcher who needs a free option. Anyone who needs the highest sensitivity, for example in oncology or transplant, should check a paid reference as well.
What is it and who owns it?
Medscape says the checker helps clinicians identify interactions "between medications, supplements, and even common foods" and lets users search for prescription drugs, OTC medications and herbal supplements (Medscape, October 2026). Medscape is a WebMD property. The page does not say who supplies the interaction data or how often it is updated.
What does it do?
You enter several drugs and the tool lists interactions with a severity category. The UI shows five categories: Contraindicated, Serious (use alternative), Significant (monitor closely), Monitor closely and Minor. It also describes the mechanism, for example CYP450 enzyme inhibition or induction, or pharmacodynamic synergism or antagonism. Third-party summaries put the database at about 9,200 prescription and OTC drugs, herbals and foods. Alcohol and tobacco coverage is not stated. The search accepts several drugs in one query. No EHR integration is mentioned. It runs as a web tool, and a third party mentions a Medscape mobile app. Only drug names are entered, so no patient data is involved.
How accurate is it?
The accuracy comparisons date from 2016 to 2020. A 2016 comparison in the Journal of Research in Pharmacy Practice (PMID 27843962) counted detected interactions out of 400: Lexi-Interact and Epocrates 250, Micromedex 236, Medscape 202 and iFacts 191. A herb and oncology drug screening study rated Lexicomp best and Medscape the best free tool (PMID 32075508). A comparison of SSRI interactions across five checkers found low agreement on severity, with Gwet AC1 between 0.12 and 0.18 (PMC12504084). In a renal transplant study, Medscape rated cyclosporine with lercanidipine as no interaction while Lexicomp and Micromedex rated it severe (J Manag Care Spec Pharm, 2020). The 2016 count means Medscape flagged 202 of 400 interactions where Lexi-Interact and Epocrates flagged 250.
Five papers used the checker to screen prescriptions: hospitals in Dhaka (394 prescriptions, PMID 39810918, 2025), cardiovascular patients on aspirin and ACE inhibitors (1,030 records, PMID 39124556, 2024), patients on targeted cancer therapy (PMID 39065792, 2024, with Lexicomp and other tools alongside), chronic kidney disease (PMID 38784027, 2024) and hypertension (123 patients, PMID 38646234, 2024). None tests its accuracy. One informal comment from a PharmD intern on Careers360 called it the best.
How much does it cost?
Medscape shows no price or paywall on the page. Third-party comparisons say it is free and requires registration (intuitionlabs.ai, pillo.care). Billing periods, trials and refunds do not apply to a free tool. Whether ads appear and whether registration is required today is not stated.
How does it compare?
Lexicomp (UpToDate Lexidrug), Micromedex, Epocrates, Drugs.com, Facts and Comparisons, Clinical Pharmacology and Skyscape are the usual alternatives. The studies above put Lexicomp and Micromedex ahead on sensitivity. Medscape's advantages are cost, speed and the mechanism it shows for each interaction.
The verdict
A resident or a pharmacy student who needs a free checker should use Medscape as a fast first screen. For a patient on a transplant regimen, chemotherapy or several CYP-active drugs, run the combination through a second source before acting. A pharmacy or hospital that already licenses Lexicomp or Micromedex has little reason to switch.
Editorial review last generated October 15, 2026. Synthesized from clinician sentiment, peer-reviewed coverage, and our editorial silo picks. Refined by hand where vendor facts change.
What it costs
All tiers are custom-quoted. The vendor does not publish per-provider list pricing.
| Tier | Monthly | Annual | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | — | — | Free to use per third-party sources (registration may be required). The Medscape page itself states no price. |
Source: vendor pricing page. Last checked October 15, 2026.
What the literature says
5 peer-reviewed studies indexed on PubMed evaluate Medscape Drug Interaction Checker in clinical contexts. The most relevant are shown below, ranked by editorial relevance score combining title match, study design, recency, and journal tier.
- Drug-Drug Interactions and Their Association With Quality of Life in Patients With Hypertension.
- Gürel N, Üresin Y, Şen S· Cureus· 2024
- Introduction This study aimed to evaluate drug-drug interactions (DDIs) and their association with the quality of life in patients with hypertension. Materials and methods This cross-sectional study included 123 patients with hypertension. DDIs were evaluated using the Medscape Drug Interaction Checker Database (Medscape, New York, NY). The EuroQol-5D (EQ-5D) Quality of Life Scale was used for each patient. Results The overall blood pressure control rate (systolic/diastolic blood pressure levels, <140/90 mmHg) was 43% (53/123). The age of the patients with uncontrolled hypertension was higher…
- Clinical Pertinence and Determinants of Potential Drug-Drug Interactions in Chronic Kidney Disease Patients: A Cross-sectional Study.
- Khanna J, Kumar S, Mehta S, et al.· J Pharm Technol· 2024
- Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is one of the major health issues effecting around 15% of world population, and its further complications has raised the need of polypharmacy for management. But this polypharmacy also upsurges the risk of potential drug-drug interactions (pDDIs) in CKD patients, which may further be responsible for increased morbidity and mortality.The main objective is therefore to evaluate the distribution, severity, causes, associated drug interactions, and clinical relevance of determination of pDDIs in CKD patients.Medical files of CKD patients examined at nephrology departm…
- Survey of Potential Drug Interactions, Use of Non-Medical Health Products, and Immunization Status among Patients Receiving Targeted Therapies.
- Rajj R, Schaadt N, Bezsila K, et al.· Pharmaceuticals (Basel)· 2024
- In recent years, several changes have occurred in the management of chronic immunological conditions with the emerging use of targeted therapies. This two-phase cross-sectional study was conducted through structured in-person interviews in 2018-2019 and 2022. Additional data sources included ambulatory medical records and the itemized reimbursement reporting interface of the National Health Insurance Fund. Drug interactions were analyzed using the UpToDate Lexicomp, Medscape drug interaction checker, and Drugs.com databases. The chi-square test was used, and odds ratios (ORs) were calculated.…
- Clinical Significance and Patterns of Potential Drug-Drug Interactions in Cardiovascular Patients: Focus on Low-Dose Aspirin and Angiotensin-Converting Enzyme Inhibitors.
- Anfinogenova ND, Stepanov VA, Chernyavsky AM, et al.· J Clin Med· 2024
- : This study assessed the patterns and clinical significance of potential drug-drug interactions (pDDIs) in patients with diseases of the cardiovascular system.: Electronic health records (EHRs), established in 2018-2023, were selected using the probability serial nested sampling method (= 1030). Patients were aged 27 to 95 years (65.0% men). Primary diagnosis of COVID-19 was present in 17 EHRs (1.7%). Medscape Drug Interaction Checker was used to characterize pDDIs. The Mann-Whitney U test and chi-square test were used for statistical analysis.: Drug numbers per record ranged from 1 to 23 in…
- Risk Factors and Patterns of Drug-Drug Interactions in Two Categories of Level-3 Hospitals in Dhaka: A Cross-Sectional Study.
- Samadd MA, Patwary FT, Islam MM, et al.· Health Sci Rep· 2025
- Drug-drug interactions (DDIs) are a significant health issue that may adversely affect the health and well-being of patients. This study assesses and compares potential DDI (pDDI) patterns, severity, and associated risk factors in government and private hospitals in Dhaka, Bangladesh. A total of 188 and 206 prescriptions were collected from various government and private hospitals' outdoor departments, respectively, by capturing pictures of the prescriptions. Bivariate analyses were performed through STATA 15. MedScape drug interaction checker was applied to identify pDDIs, while their conseq…
Other drug info
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No public price, quoted per organization. No current individual subscription was found.