---
title: "Good news, fellow hypochondriacs: Symptom checker apps aren’t as reliable as you might think"
description: "Good news for those of us who use symptom checker apps and always come up with terrifying results: A new study has found that these apps..."
---

[aiaTranslations: The Language of Life Sciences Blog ](https://aiatranslations.com/blog)

# [Good news, fellow hypochondriacs: Symptom checker apps aren’t as reliable as you might think](https://aiatranslations.com/blog/post/good-news-fellow-hypochondriacs-symptom-checker-apps-aren-t-as-reliable-as-you-might-think)

 Written by [Alysa Salzberg](https://aiatranslations.com/blog/author/alysa-salzberg) | Jun 4, 2020 4:00:00 AM

Good news for those of us who use symptom checker apps and always come up with terrifying results: A new study has found that these apps have an extremely low rate of getting diagnoses right.

The study included 27 symptom checker apps, including well-known ones from WebMD and the Mayo Clinic, and found that on average, these apps were only correct 36% of the time.

Fortunately, they were a bit better at determining whether or not a person should go to the emergency room.

Of course, this doesn't mean you shouldn't talk to a doctor if you have worrying symptoms - just that you shouldn't totally freak out when an app tells you what it might be.

[Read on](https://gizmodo.com/symptom-checker-apps-are-awful-at-guessing-the-right-il-1843527045) to learn more about symptom checker apps’ tendency to misdiagnose (and throw so many of us into needless panic).

[*Image source*](https://www.omegaweb.com/the-top-malware-removal-tools/worried-at-computer/)

*Contact Our Writer – *[*Alysa Salzberg*](http://www.alysasalzberg.com/)

[View full post](https://aiatranslations.com/blog/post/good-news-fellow-hypochondriacs-symptom-checker-apps-aren-t-as-reliable-as-you-might-think)

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