Epic Expands EHR Market Share as Rivals Lose Customers
KLAS Research characterized partnership and responsiveness as key drivers of customer satisfaction
Epic Systems has bolstered its status as the dominant player among vendors of electronic health records (EHR) software, winning nearly 70% of new hospital contracts in 2024. Most, if not all, of these rollouts will include clinical laboratory data imported into the EHR system.
According to a recent market share report from KLAS Research, Epic added a net 176 acute care multispecialty hospitals in 2024, marking its largest-ever annual net gain, KLAS reported. Meanwhile, Epic’s largest rival, Oracle Health, saw a net loss of 74 hospitals during the year. Meditech, the No. 3 EHR vendor, saw a net decline of 57 hospitals.
The report, titled, “US Acute Care EHR Market Share 2025,” was based on interviews with healthcare organizations as well as data from vendors and other sources, KLAS said.
“Across all vendors, the level of partnership has emerged as a key differentiator,” KLAS stated in its report. “A vendor’s reputation for listening to customers, taking feedback, and implementing requested changes greatly impacts customer satisfaction—often translating to gains in overall market share.”
In their KLAS report, authors Bradley Hunter (left) and Paul Warburton (right) wrote, “Though still high overall, acute care EHR purchase energy slightly cooled in 2024. Health systems continued to drive most of the decisions.” Photo copyrights: KLAS Research.)
Drivers of Epic’s Success
Among large health systems—defined as those with more than 10 hospitals—KLAS noted the following market share for EHR vendors:
- Epic—48%.
- Oracle—27%.
- Meditech—15%.
- All other EHR vendors—10%.
Among all acute care hospitals, Epic’s market share is 42.3% compared with 22.9% for Oracle and 14.8% for Meditech.
Epic also dominates in terms of percentage of hospital beds, with a 54.9% market share compared with 22.1% for Oracle and 12.7% for Meditech.
Overall, acute care EHR purchases declined in 2024, as 272 hospitals bought an EHR system, compared with 319 in 2023, KLAS reported.
The report attributed Epic’s success to “the stability and interoperability capabilities of the product as well as generally high satisfaction among current customers. Beyond strictly technological considerations, Epic’s reputation for customer partnership has brought them to the forefront of most EHR considerations.”
Oracle’s Market Decline
For the first time, Oracle declined to offer a list of new contracts, KLAS reported. To arrive at its estimates for the company, KLAS said it used “publicly available resources and our standard internal research methods.”
Oracle gained entry to the EHR market with its 2022 acquisition of Cerner Corporation, a deal valued at $28.3 billion at the time.
What accounts for Oracle’s market decline? “As has been the case historically, healthcare organizations continue to cite poor partnership and a lack of follow-through on promises as some of their biggest concerns,” KLAS reported, adding, “While many Cerner customers hoped the 2022 acquisition by Oracle Health would lead to relationship improvements, the vendor’s loyalty and relationship ratings have dropped over 10 points since November 2021 (just before the announced acquisition).”
On the other hand, current and potential Oracle customers have expressed “cautious optimism” due to recent technology developments, KLAS reported, including rollouts of Clinical AI Agent, Seamless Exchange, and Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, plus announcements of a new EHR system and patient portal.
“More than one-third of customers report that over the last six months, there has been a positive change in the vendor’s execution/delivery,” KLAS reported. “This represents a notable change from the overall sentiment during the last couple of years.”
—Stephen Beale
