Stanton Optical advertises two pairs of glasses and a free eye exam for $79. That is a genuinely aggressive price, and it is also the reason the standalone exam fee is hard to find: the whole business model is built to make you buy the glasses.
The company does publish the number, in two places on its own site. This guide gives you the standalone exam price, what the two-pair and progressive bundles actually include, the contact lens exam that the free-exam offer quietly excludes, how the telehealth exam model works, and why Stanton Optical and My Eyelab share the same price list.
What Does a Stanton Optical Eye Exam Cost Without Insurance?
All figures below were read directly from stantonoptical.com on September 5 2026. Unlike warehouse clubs, where an independent optometrist sets their own fee, Stanton advertises these as national prices with named state exceptions, and it repeats a warning on every pricing page that exam pricing may vary by state.
| Service or offer | Low | Typical | High |
|---|---|---|---|
| Comprehensive eye exam | $0 (with any 2-pair purchase) | $79 | $109 (AK, ND) |
| Contact lens exam (includes glasses Rx and trial pair) | $0 (Contacts Club renewal year) | $119 | $129 (OK, AR, AK, ND, SD) |
| 2 pairs, single-vision plastic, plus free exam | $79 | $79 | $79 + upgrades |
| 2 pairs, digital progressives, plus free exam | $175 | $175 | $175 + upgrades |
| Frames purchased on their own | $64 | varies | designer pricing |
| Contact lens value pack (90-day BioTrue 1 Day, free CL exam) | $149 | $149 | $225 (astigmatism) |
| Frame Club membership (1 year) | $49 | $49 | $49 |
| Contacts Club membership | $20 | $20 | $20 |
Source: Stanton Optical FAQ, eye exam page and offer pages, September 5 2026. The astigmatism value pack figure is the $149 pack plus the $76 the company charges for a three-month astigmatism supply.
How the “free” exam actually works at the register
This is the part almost nobody reads. Stanton’s own fine print says you are charged for the exam in-store, and then receive a credit applied to your retail purchase equal to the lesser of the exam cost or $79 ($109 in Alaska and North Dakota).
In practice that means the exam is free only if you complete the glasses purchase. Walk out with just the prescription and you have paid $79. It also means the “2 pairs for $79” headline is really “$79 for the exam, and two pairs of basic single-vision glasses thrown in at no additional charge.”
Judged that way it is a strong offer, and it is meaningfully cheaper than the two-pair bundles at America’s Best. The catch is the same one every value chain uses: the $79 covers blue tag frames with single-vision plastic lenses and nothing else.
The contact lens exam is excluded
The free-exam promotion applies to the eyeglass exam. A contact lens exam is $119, rising to $129 in five states, and Stanton says so on both its FAQ and its eye exam page. It includes a glasses prescription and a free trial pair.
There are two ways around paying full price. The $149 contact lens value pack bundles a 90-day supply of Bausch + Lomb BioTrue 1 Day sphere lenses with a free contact lens exam, and the $20 Contacts Club membership makes next year’s contact lens exam free while adding 20% off an annual lens supply.
What Drives the Price
The exam is run by a separate medical group, not by the retailer. Stanton Optical states plainly that it does not perform eye exams. They are provided by independent optometrists and ophthalmologists affiliated with Physicians Eyecare Group. That separation is why the exam price sits in fine print and why the company hedges it with state-by-state variation.
Telehealth is the cost lever. A technician in the store runs the prescreening (tonometry, autorefraction, retinal and anterior imaging), then the acuities and refraction portion is performed remotely by the doctor over video with an online technician assisting. Now Optics CEO Daniel Stanton has described this ocular telehealth service as the “unlock” that lets the business scale. It is also the reason a $79 exam is possible at all, and the reason some people prefer a conventional in-person exam elsewhere.
In-house frames and an in-store lab. Now Optics says roughly 90% of the products Stanton sells are its own brands, and most customers walk out with finished glasses inside 45 minutes because the lab is on site. Vertical integration plus own-label frames is what funds the $79 price. Frames start at $64 when bought on their own.
Upgrades. The bundle prices assume blue tag frames and plastic lenses. Anti-reflective coating, polycarbonate or high-index thinning, photochromic lenses and designer frames all move the number. Stanton says this directly in its offer terms: “additional services or upgrades may change price of offer.” Our glasses cost guide covers what those add-ons cost elsewhere so you can judge the quote in front of you.
Scale and state law. Now Optics operates more than 300 locations in 32 states, is expanding by 30 to 50 stores a year and is piloting shop-in-shops inside Staples. Some states regulate advertised free-service offers, which is why the Alaska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Arkansas and South Dakota prices differ and why Stanton posts a Florida notice giving patients 72 hours to cancel and be reimbursed for services performed in response to a free or discounted-fee advertisement.
Cash Price vs. Insurance
Stanton is explicit that insurance and in-store promotions do not mix. You choose one lane or the other. If you use a vision plan, the compensating offer is a discount on a second pair, though the company’s own pages disagree on the size: the FAQ says 60% off your second pair with insurance, while the special offers page currently advertises 30% off. Ask the store to confirm which is live before you decide.
That makes the math easy to run. If your plan has a low exam copay and a frame allowance of $130 or more, running it through insurance can beat the cash bundle, especially if you want upgrades the promotion excludes. If your allowance is thin, or you have no vision coverage at all, $79 for an exam plus two complete pairs is very hard to beat.
For scale, the CMS Medicare Physician & Other Practitioners by Geography and Service dataset (2024 claims) shows a national average submitted charge of $226.69 for CPT 92014, a comprehensive eye exam for an established patient in an office setting, against a Medicare allowed amount of $124.79. Medicare does not pay for routine exams for glasses, so those figures cover medically necessary visits, but they show the gap: Stanton charges $79 for a service independent offices bill at roughly three times that.
One protection survives any pricing structure. Under the FTC’s Eyeglass Rule, the prescriber must give you a copy of your eyeglass prescription immediately after the refraction and before offering to sell you glasses, cannot charge a separate fee for the prescription itself, and cannot condition the exam on buying eyewear. Pay the $79, take the paper, and shop anywhere.
How to Pay Less
Decide the glasses question before you sit down. The exam-only price and the exam-plus-two-pairs price are both $79. If you need glasses, take the bundle. If you genuinely do not, understand that you are paying $79 for the exam and that no credit is coming.
Get the upgrade quote itemized before you agree to anything. Ask what the total is with your actual prescription, line by line, and which items are optional. A $79 ticket can triple once coatings, thinning and a non-blue-tag frame are added. Use our fair price tool to sanity-check the number you are given.
Run the club math honestly. The $49 Frame Club (four frames over a year plus 50% off lenses) only pays off if you actually replace frames often. The $20 Contacts Club is the better deal for most contact wearers, since it makes a $119 exam free the following year and adds 20% off an annual lens supply.
Buy the lenses elsewhere. Your contact lens prescription is portable, and online sellers routinely undercut in-store pricing on the same box. See our Acuvue Oasys cost guide and our contact lens cost guide for the annual-supply spread across retailers.
Price two competitors before you commit. Stanton is one of several value chains running the same playbook. Compare Costco, Walmart and Target Optical, and read our general eye exam guide for what a private optometrist charges.
If cost is the real barrier, check the free and sliding-scale options first. Federally qualified health centers, school vision programs and vision charities provide exams and glasses based on income. Our guide to free clinics and sliding-scale care covers how to find them.
If the visit turns into a medical eye visit, treat the bill like a medical bill. A routine exam that becomes a medical evaluation can generate a charge you did not agree to. Ask for an itemized statement and a self-pay discount before paying; our medical bill negotiation guide walks through the script.
A Note on Promotional Pricing
Everything above is promotional. The 2 for $79 and 2 for $175 offers carry no posted expiration date as of September 5 2026, but other offers on the same page do (a contact lens promotion listed on the special offers page carried an 8/31 end date), and Stanton reserves the right to vary pricing by state and by store. Third-party sites still circulate older Stanton figures such as 2 for $59.95. Check the offer page for the day you are shopping rather than trusting any published number, this one included.
The Bottom Line
$79 is the number that matters, and it buys either the exam alone or the exam plus two pairs of basic single-vision glasses. There is no discount for skipping the glasses, so if you need eyewear at all, take the bundle.
$119 buys the contact lens exam, which the free-exam promotion does not cover, and the $20 Contacts Club makes the following year’s version free. Everything past blue tag frames and plastic lenses is priced separately, so get the itemized quote before you nod at the counter.