Top & Best Term Insurance Plans in India

Top 7 Best Term Insurance Plans in India in 2019-2020Best Term Insurance Plans in India in 2020


One of the best ways to secure your family’s future, even in your absence is to consider taking a term insurance plan. There are plenty of insurance companies and they are offering offline and online term insurance plans. Term Insurance Plans would come with low cost and the high sum assured and secures your family, even when you are not there in this world. What is Term Insurance Plan? How to pick-up best term insurance plan in India? Which are the Top & Best Term Plans in India for 2020 that have the highest claim settlement ratio?

Also Read: Best Health Insurance Policy in India for Family

What is Term Insurance Plan?


If you are aware about the Term insurance plan, skip this section.

Term insurance Plan is a simple insurance plan where if the insured dies, their family / nominee would get the sum assured. There is no maturity amount in the term insurance plan. These are insurance plans that have risk coverage only. One would not get any money back at maturity.

As per guidelines from IRDA, after 3 years from the date of policy, a claim cannot be rejected citing any reason. Hence, the claim settlement ratio is no more a major criteria in deciding the best term insurance plan. However, it still needs to be considered as one of the points while buying a term insurance plan.

Why do we need a term insurance plan?


The entire family, including children, would depend on te earning members in the family. What happens if the head of the family or earning member met with an accident and not in this world anymore? While the loss of the family member cannot be replaced with anything, it also impacts the financial status of the family. Such loss can affect child’s education, delay the daughter’s marriage and affect the daily life of a spouse. One of the best ways to secure from such sudden negative surprises in our life is to take Term Insurance Plan. Since term insurance plans come with low cost and provides high coverage of insurance, this is one of the best ways to secure your life. Earlier one used to think of LIC Policy when we talk about life insurance policy. Now there are several private insurance companies that are competing with LIC.

What are the benefits of Term Insurance Plans?


Top Best Term Insurance Plans in India in 2019-2020-Benefits of Term insurance plan

How we filtered Top and Best Term Insurance Plans in India for 2020?


There are various parameters that can be considered while picking up top and best term insurance plan in India. However, I have considered below key parameters while picking the right term insurance policy.

1) Insurance Claim Settlement Ratio (CSR): Though the CSR is not the only criteria, it is one of the important factor when you go for best term plan in India. As of 2017-2018, there are 68 insurance companies which are registered in India, out of which only 24 are in life insurance business. Out of them 10 companies have declared claim settlement ratio of >= 95%. CSR is insurance claims settled over the total insurance claims received by the insurance company during the year. Lower CSR means, the company is honoring lower claims than what it received and rejecting some claims. In future your family could be victim out of such rejected claims. I have filtered insurance companies that have a high claim settlement ratio of 95% to 100%.

2) Insurance Company Reputation: No one can tell you how good is an insurance company in India. The higher the duration of the insurance company registered or existence, it is better. Hence, we have filtered Insurance companies that have a good operating history of more than 5 years.

3) Additional Features in Term insurance plan: What about a good insurance company that do not offer useful features or benefits? No one would really want to opt for that. I have filtered Term insurance plan which have basic features + additional features that would be helpful for individuals who are planning to take term plans.

4) Plans with Low Premium: While Premium is not the only criteria in selecting an insurance plan; we have given preference to term insurance plans which are being offered at low premiums with more features.

One should check term insurance plan comparison before taking up a term insurance plan. You can buy term insurance online from respective insurance portals.

Should you check term insurance plans comparison at any insurance aggregators portals?


There are few portals like policybazaar.com or policyx.com that provides a comparison of term insurance plans. However, I felt sometimes these websites are biased. You can do the comparison of such plans on such aggregator portals, but you go and buy term insurance plans directly from insurance companies.

Top 7 Best Term Insurance Plans in India in 2020


Here are the Top 7 Best Term Insurance Plans for 2020. We are giving major features of these term insurance plans.

Top#1 – Max Life Term Insurance Plan Plus


Top 7 Best Term Insurance Plans in India in 2019-2020-Maxlife term insurance plan plusMax Life Term Insurance Plan Plus comes with 3 options in its plan. Below are the major features of this term insurance plan from Max Life.

Minimum Entry age is 18 Years and Maximum entry age is 60 years

Maximum maturity age is 70 Years.

Policy tenure is between 10 years and 50 years.

Minimum Sum Assured is ₹ 25 Lakhs.

Maximum Sum Assured – ₹ 100 Crores.

The premium payment mode can be monthly, quarterly, half yearly and annually.

Limited Premium payment option available where you can pay the premium for a limited period, however, enjoy term insurance plan for the entire tenure of the plan. You can save up to 30% of premiums of you opt for this.

Comprehensive Accident Benefit Rider available in this plan.

This plan is available in 3 coverage a) Basic Life Cover b) Basic Life Cover+Monthly cover c) Basic Term Plan Cover + Increasing Monthly Income

The claim settlement ratio in 2020 is 98.74%, which is highest among all insurance companies.

Its Basic Premium is approx. ₹ 8,378 per annum (Excl taxes) for a 30 year non smoker for a 30 year policy for 1 Crore sum assured for basic life cover.

Its Basic Premium is approx. ₹ 12,272 per annum (Excl taxes) for a 30 year non smoker for a 30 year policy for 1 Crore sum assured for Basic Life Cover + Increasign monthly income option.

Max Life Term Insurance plan is one of the good term insurance plans for 2020 which has high claim settlement ratio and comes with low premium.

Top#2 – LIC Tech Term Insurance Plan


LIC Tech Term Insurance Plan – Positive and Negatives-minLIC is trusted brand in the insurance segment in India that has been catering to insurance for several decades. One of the best term insurance plans that come from LIC is Tech Term Insurance Plan. LIC’s Term is a regular premium non-participating “Online Term Insurance Policy” which provides financial protection for the insured’s family in case of his/her unfortunate demise. This is online plan and no intermediaries will be involved.

Here are the features of the LIC Term Insurance Plan.

Minimum Entry age is 18 Years and Maximum entry age is 65 years

Risk Coverage is upto 80 years of age.

Policy tenure is between 10 years and 40 years.

Minimum Sum Assured is ₹ 50 Lakhs.

Maximum Sum Assured – No limit.

It offers both level sum assured and increasing sum assured. In level sum assured, the sum assured is fixed throughout the policy period. However in increasing sum assured, Sum assured would increase year on year from 6th year to the 15th year and from there, these are constant beyond that period. However, the premiums would be high for such level sum assured options.

LIC Policy offers accidental death benefit rider which is optional and comes with additional premiums.

The claim settlement ratio in 2020 is 97.79%.

All kinds of death, including accidental deaths are covered under this plan except suicide during the first year.

One can propose on their own name only and cannot take on spouse name who is not working.

LIC policy offer flexible premium options like regular premiums (monthly, quarterly, half-yearly and yearly), single premium and limited period premium options

The premiums are little high in LIC. If you take LIC Tech Term Insurance plan for ₹ 1 Crore and have opted for regular annual premium, in a simple sum assured, the premium works out to be ₹ 5,368 for 20 years individual and for the 20 year policy term. It would be ₹ 7,216 for 30 years individual and ₹ 13,770 for 40 years individual. No discounts applied here. You can check LIC premium calculator to know the exact premium before opting.

NRIs can also apply when they are staying in India and term insurance plan is valid in the specified countries list.

Generally individuals who want to increase their sum assured have to buy a new term insurance plan with the additional sum assured. However, they can opt for increasing sum assured where the sum assured would be increased during the tenure.

LIC Tech Term Insurance Plan is one of the Best Life Insurance Policy in India in 2020 as it has brand value as well as trusted by Lakhs of people in India.

If you have any queries on LIC Tech Term plan, you can contact online_dmkt@licindia.com or call toll free number 1800 227 717 or landline numbers 022-26127303-05,022-67819282,022-67819284.

You can Review LIC Tech Term Insurance Plan here.

Top#3 – ICICI iProtect Smart Term Insurance Plan


Top Best Term Insurance Plans in India in 2019-2020-icici iprotect smartHere are the key features of ICICI iProtect Smart Term Plan.

Minimum Entry age is 18 Years and Maximum entry age is 65 years

Maximum maturity age is 99 Years.

Policy tenure is between 5 years and 40 years.

Minimum Sum Assured – Based on minimum premium of ₹ 2,400 per annum.

Maximum Sum Assured – No limit.

There is optional rider that it pays if diagnosed of any of the 34 Critical Illnesses.

It comes with 4 levels of protection 1) Life  2) Life Plus 3) Life and Health and 4) All in one.

Claim settlement ratio in 2020 is 98.58%

Premium is approx. ₹ 8,279 per annum for a 30 year non smoker for a 30 year policy for ₹ 1 Crore sum assured. Accident death cover would cost ₹ 2,803 additional premium for ₹ 50 Lakhs Coverage and Critical illness cover cost ₹ 15,569 for ₹ 10 Lakhs coverage. These 2 are optional riders which you may consider based on your requirement.

I feel ICICI iProtect Term plan is one of the best online term insurance plan in India as it comes with several benefits and riders which are useful.

Top#4 – HDFC Click 2 Protect Plus Term Insurance Plan


Below are the major features of HDFC Click 2 Protect Plus Term plan.

Minimum Entry age is 18 Years and Maximum entry age is 65 years

Maximum maturity age is 85 Years.

Policy tenure is between 5 years and 40 years.

Minimum Sum Assured is ₹ 10 Lakhs.

Maximum Sum Assured – No limit.

There are various options like Life Option, 3D Life Option, Extra Life Option, Life Long Protection Option, 3D Life long protection, Return of Premium Option etc. available in this plan.

The claim settlement ratio in 2020 is 99.04%.

The Basic Premium is approx. ₹ 9,717 (Excl taxes) per annum for a 30 year non smoker for a 30 year policy for ₹ 1 Crore sum assured (Lumpsum payout option).

If you take 3D Life that covers waiver of premiums in case of critical illnesses or premium waiver in case of permanent disability, the premium works out to be ₹ 10,134 for similar details.

This Term plan has several riders which make this as a unique term insurance plan for 2020.

Top#5 – SBI Life eShield Term Insurance Plan


Top 7 Best Term Insurance Plans in India in 2019-2020-SBI eshield insurance planeShield is the SBI Term Insurance Plan, which comes with unique features.

It comes with two plan options 1) Level Cover Benefit 2) Increasing cover benefit.

Minimum Entry age is 18 Years and Maximum entry age is 65 years for level cover benefit and 60 years for increasing cover benefit.

Maximum maturity age is 80 Years.

Policy tenure is between 5 years and 30 years.

Minimum Sum Assured is ₹ 35 Lakhs.

Maximum Sum Assured – No limit.

There is inbuilt benefit “Accelerated Terminal Illness Benefit” available.

There are other riders available like a) Accidental Death Benefit Rider 2) Accidental Total and Permanent Disability Benefit Rider.

The claim settlement ratio in 2020 is 95.03%

The premium is approx. ₹ 9,400 per annum (Excl taxes) for a 30 year non smoker for a 30 year policy for 1 Crore sum assured for Level Cover Benefit.

The premium is approx. ₹ 11,720 per annum (Excl taxes) for a 30 year non smoker for a 30 year policy for 1 Crore sum assured for Increasing Cover Benefit plan.

SBI Life eShield Term Insurance plan is one of the best term insurance plan in India for 2020 which comes with inbuilt benefits and riders.

Top#6 – TATA AIA Life iRaksha Supreme Online Term Insurance Plan


There are 4 variants of term insurance plans offered by TATA AIA Life. One of the good plans with TATA AIA Life Insurance iRaksha Supreme Online Term insurance plan. Below are the major features of this plan.

Minimum Entry age is 18 Years and Maximum entry age is 70 years.

Maximum maturity age is 80 Years.

Policy tenure is between 10 years and 40 years.

Minimum Sum Assured is ₹ 75 Lakhs.

Maximum Sum Assured – No limit.

The claim settlement ratio in 2020 is 98%.

Rate benefits for customers opting for higher level of protection (Sum Assured of ₹ 75 Lacs & above).

The premium is approx. ₹ 8,000 per annum for a 30 year non smoker for a 30 year policy for a sum assured of ₹ 1 Crore.

Also Read: Which is the best LIC Term Insurance for 1 Crore?

Top#7 – Aditya Birla Sun Life DigiShield Plan


Top 7 Best Term Insurance Plans in India in 2019-2020-ABSL Digishield planThere are 4 term plans from ABSLI. However DigiShield Plan is online plan and comes with low premiums.

Minimum Entry age is 18 Years and Maximum entry age is 65 years

Maximum maturity age is 85 Years.

Policy tenure is between 10 years and 50 years.

Minimum Sum Assured is ₹ 30 Lakhs.

Maximum Sum Assured – No limit.

There are 4 options available in plan 1) Level Sum Assured 2) Increasing Sum Assured.

There is inbuilt terminal illness benefit.

There are 4 optional riders 1) Accidental Death and Accident disability rider 2) Critical illness rider 3) Surgical Care Rider 4) Hospital Care Rider. However, these riders come with additional premiums.

You can add your spouse also to this term insurance plan along with you.

The claim settlement ratio in 2020 is 96.38%

The premium is approx. ₹ 8,468 per annum for a 30 year non smoker for a 30 year policy for a sum assured of ₹ 1 Crore for Level Sum assured plan.

The premium is approx. ₹ 14,200 per annum for a 30 year non smoker for a 30 year policy for a sum assured of ₹ 1 Crore for Increasing Sum assured plan.

Aegon Religare iTerm Insurance Plan recommended by us last year has company claim settlement ratio of 95% for FY2017-18, hence it is not in our list now (Since we are covering > 95% only in this list). If you have taken this term insurance plan earlier, you can continue this plan.

Frequently Asked Questions


Here are some of the FAQs

1) Why LIC Policy premiums are higher in term plans?

LIC has trusted brand and has high claim ratio. Owing to this, it charges higher premiums compared to private insurance companies

2) Which is the best life insurance policy in India for beginners?

For beginners or youngsters, the income could be low. In such case, considering low premium term plan in India from above list could be good idea to start.

3) Which Term Insurance is best in India for women?

Most of the above indicated term plans suits women. One can check whether there are discounted price on the premium for women before opting.

Conclusion: There are several good term insurance plans in India. None of us can predict the claim settlement ratio in the future. You should check term insurance comparison and the pick-up term plan that has features suitable to you. You can consider taking 2 term plans, e.g. Instead of 1 Crore Term plan from a single insurance company, you can take ₹ 50 Lakhs each from two insurance companies to avoid any rejections in future of say 10 or 20 years down the line. Term Insurance plans are best which comes with low premiums and high risk coverage. This should be your first step in financial planning.

Readers, have you opted for any of the best life insurance policies in India? What are your experiences with your insurance company?

If you enjoyed this article, share it with your friends and colleagues through Facebook and Twitter.

Suresh KP

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45 comments

  1. (1) I am of 68 and want buy a new term plan. What are the options available? I am healthy and has no health issue.
    (2) my wife of 64 Y 6 M has cardiac arythmmia of ventricular extrasystole. What are the chances of getting a term plan. Suggest a good company.

  2. I am 27 right now. I am thinking for the cover till 70-75. I think i want to cover critical illness as well. Which option should i choose ?

  3. Max newyork life insurance covers till 83 years and also covers upto 40 critical illness and very low premium.This is one if the best term insurance to avail.

  4. I want to buy a term policy of Max life and I have some questions regarding this policy.
    1. Which is best option to buy it from it’s own site or through policy bazar, and what is policy bazar’s activity during claim settlement?
    2. My retirement age is 58 and I want to select the policy coverage up to 58 years of my age. Is this good decision?
    3. Which payout option should I select, lump sum payout or monthly payout or increasing monthly payout?
    So please help me.

    1. Hello Arunava, Policybazaar sites are good to compare various policies. But I would advice you to directly deal with maxlife and take online term insurance plan 1) Pls purchase term plan directly from insurance company website 2) My advice is to select term plan that covers maximum age of 65 or 70. If you are retiring at 58 and think at that time that you don’t need policy after 58, you can discontinue, but if you want to continue, you need to have an option. Creation that option now itself 3) Lumpsum payout would always give you option on how to utilize. On other hand, monthly payout option would help you to have regular income. It has pros and cons. You can check this article which provide some additional info about various monthly income options available in term insurance plan. https://myinvestmentideas.com/2019/10/what-is-monthly-income-plan-in-term-insurance/

    1. Yes, possible. However like LIC Tech Term plan where only proposer can apply and should be working. Other than LIC, others are offering term plans. Pls reach out to customer care of specific insurance company which you want to apply for more info

  5. A friend of mine is TATA AIA employee he suggested me Sampoorna Raksha plan to me like the details below
    50L SA, Limited Premium for 10 years, 57 years term, ADB Rider and the premium comes 20234. Is that good ? ( I’m interested too)
    I’m looking take one another policy with 25L SA in other company like ICICI pro, Max Life, Exide Life

  6. I am paying 505 PM for 25 L Sum assured for me(31) and 491 PM for 50 L for my wife(25yrs) from Aegon insurance.. I feel SA is less so planning to upgrade but i dont have option to inc SA. So now i am thinking to either buy a new plan from Aegon with high SA like 75 L and I crore and stop the existing plan ( or ) Should take from LIC Tech term and stop the existing plan ? Only thing is in LIC Tech term there is no critical illness cover.. so what could be the best option

    1. Hello Sudhakar, Few comments. 1) LIC Tech term plan comes with high premium. If you are okay, you can take it. 2) LIC Tech Term plan can be taken only by self owned. Means if your spouse is working no issues, otherwise, it would be difficult to take this term plan on her name 2) Aegon Term plan is also good. 3) Instead of cancelling entirely, my advice is that you can continue 1st term plan and consider taking term plan for incremental sum assured either from Aegon life or from LIC

  7. Edelweiss tokio and Canara HSBC very low premium. But claim settlement ratio very low.
    And other companies high claim settlement ratio but high premium so I am confused suggest me what should I do.

    1. Hello Hiralal, don’t take risk. If you are considering your first term plan, go for top 5 insurance companies that has high claim settlement ratio. If you are looking for 2nd or 3rd term plan, you can rethink about low premium on such term plans

    1. Hi Lal, It is good, however it recently came into top 10 term insurance plans list. My suggestion is to take a term plan from top-5 list at the beginning of your financial plannig. In future if you are planning for additional risk coverage plans, you can go for that.

  8. Hi
    I have taken PNB Metlife term plan recently. Is it a good company? I’m seeing many bad reviews about it. Plz guide me.. thank you

  9. Prince Kumar
    My age is 32 and my spouse is house wife.I think to take term plan with spouse from pnbmetlife or canarahsbc obc… please suggest it is correct decision.please advise

    1. Hello Prince, Joint term plans comes with severals strings attached to it. My advice is that you should take seperate plans for you and your spouse. In future even if you want to shift one of the plan you can cancel one and take another plan with new insurance company

  10. I am planning to buy 1 CR term plan, please suggest which insurance company term plan is good and settlement is easy.

  11. Hello Suresh,
    I have been a insurer since 2 months for aegon iterm, of 1cr for me and 50L for my spouse. I have taken this because spouse is also eligible to add the policy.. I am in a dilemma like was it a good idea to choose like that or else can I invest in other savings plan for spouse by removing current term plan ?

    And another suggested go for Hdfc can pay 5 for 5 years and relax for next 50 years

    Which one is best? And can I split 1cr to 50-50 to insurance companies now?

    Finally, how good is aegon insurance company?

    1. Hi Nari, Thanks for your queries 1) Aegon is good. You can continue 2) When you said you took term plan for your spouse too. If spouse is also working, it is essential to take a term plan for them too. However one need to take seperate policies. Joint policies comes with more or less same premium, but lot of T&Cs attached. Some policies lapses if one of the member dies. You can check the Pros and cons of this. Since you already took it, it is easy to identify them 3) Which policy is HDFC where you are saying pay for 5 years and relax for 50 years. I can advice further once I know the policy name + Premium which you would pay yearly for 5 years 4) Instead of taking 1 policy, it is better to take 2 policies from two different insurance companies. We are seeing that claim settlement ratio changes every year. Don’t take risk. Consider two policies either Rs 50 L each or if you already taken 1 Cr policy and planning to add additional one in future, you can take from different company at that time

  12. Hi, I think you are doing a wonderful job with these posts. However, it comes with great responsibility. You have prioritized claim settlement ration of LIC as one of the highest. However, you gave not gone into the numbers. LIC’s 90%+ claim settlement has been for endowment plans which have money back guarantee between 1 lakh – 2 lakh. Plus LIC is oldest and has one of the highest premiums. It has failed to evolve and compete with other companies like Aegon Life insurance which has lowest premium for 1 cr sum assured when considered without riders. Claims settled by other companies suggested here by you like Max were for below 35 lakh rs policies, LIC below 2 lakh, ICICI upto 70 lakh, HDFC upto 35-40 lcs, SBI 32 lcs, Tata 45-30 lcs, aditya birla 45-50 lcs & AEGON 90lakh-95 lakhs.

    1. Shashank, Thanks for your comments. Here we are talking about over all claim settlement ratios of the companies. Yes, we can go deeper. Since LIC is the oldest insurance company, yes many individuals has taken smaller plans earlier and might be continuing now. The 1 Crore or 2 Crore policies came only in the last few years, hence claims for them may happen in the long run.

  13. Hi sir,
    i am currently holding Icici prudential term life plan but looking at the prospects provided by Edelweiss tokio zindagi plus, can we consider this plan?

    1. Srinath, Edleweiss Tokio is new insurance company that came about 5 years back. The claim settlement ratio was as low as 85% in 2014-2015 and 2015-2016. Claim Settlement ratio improved in the last 2 years only. Hence I would advice you to consider plans from insurance companies that are operating for long term and high claim settlement ratio. You can check for LIC eterm plan and HDFC life (since you already have ICICI Life term plan).

  14. In Max life term insurance, what do you mean Basic Life Cover + Increasing monthly income option. i am planning to opt this life cover policy. can you please explain a bit more. I am looking for insurance life cover of Rs. 1 crore.

    I dont want to pay Premium for many years. I just want to pay for few years and it should cover up to the age of 70+

  15. Suresh,

    Good article with the latest statistics.

    Can you comment on term plans with limited premium payment option? It’s like, policy tenure is 40 years but you pay only for 5 years and of course the premium amount is much higher compared to the standard premium payment options.

  16. please send me endowment policy dob 01/01/1962 LTI I CANNOT SIGNATURE MY RELEVANT
    DOCUMENT lti even pan card also bank account

    1. Hello Hanmanth, PNB Metlife term insurance plan could have good features, however its claim settlemnt ratio is only 82%, hence we have not considered. It means that every 100 claims made, they are paying only 82.

  17. Try to get more info abt term insurance of otheres co. also…and abt policy bazzar they are one of the best comparer and i think you dont have engough knoeledge of online term plan…mera term plan of pnb metlife insurance is one of the cheaper online term plan…which give civer till 99 years,other two off line plans are offered by pnb metlife,mera jeevan surksha and ajivan surksha plan with wholelife plan and with one time premium paying and limited pay…but online term is cheaper then both..

    1. Hanmanth, I indicated on your other commnent. PNB Met life has 82% claim settlement ratio, hence I have not considered them as this is one of the important parameter in choosing a term plan.

  18. Thank you for this analysis. I’ll share it with my friends as well.
    My query is that I’m looking for a plan that cover travel abroad. I need to travel frequently, so the plan is valid there as well.
    Also, many insurers are asking for a Tele medical only. How correct is that?
    My profile
    30 yrs, Male, non smoker, 1cr plan

    I am confused between, MaxLife, HdFc and LIC.
    Please guide.

    1. Shantanu, Most of the term insurance plans would continue to cover if you are abroad. However, just check this point when you are considering the plan. For a 30 years person, there is no medical check-ups required, hence they might be asking you do only tele medicals. You need not worry about it as long as you disclose all facts in the policy application form. You can consider any of the 3 insurance companies indicated by you. Personally I would split my term plan into two and consider plans from 2 different companies to reduce the risk in future

  19. We have to consider the ‘Force Majeure clause’ of each term insurance plan of each company. I think some companies are not covering death risk due to war, death due to terrorism attack etc. This is just my personal opinion and findings.

  20. Hi Sir,

    What is the difference between the following:

    1. Buying an insurance in online (by visiting the company website)
    2. Directly approaching the insurance office and buying the insurance
    3. Buying the insurance from an agent?

    I see that out of these option 1 is cheaper, but will there be any issue while claiming due to online?

    1. Hi Karthikeyan, If you are buying online, you are removing agents/branches as intermediary, hence these would come at lesser costs. Buying from insurance agent or through any insurance branch would have similar premiums. However while term insurance plans or few retirement policies are offered by online, all other endowment, money back policies are offered only through agent or branch.

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