Private company

WebMD

Logo: WebMD, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons⁴

American corporation which provides health information services

WebMD is an American corporation which publishes online news and information about human health and well-being. The WebMD website also includes information about drugs and is an important healthcare information website and the most popular consumer-oriented health site. WebMD was started in 1998 by internet entrepreneur Jeff Arnold.² It is part of Internet Brands.¹ Wikipedia text CC BY-SA 4.0

Last updated Oct 20, 2026.

Overview

1996Founded¹

Industryhealth care¹
HeadquartersNew York City¹
Websitewww.webmd.com
Legal formDelaware corporation¹
LEI549300LJX6TBSG0JPD93³
StatusActive³
LEI statusLapsed (not renewed)³
Registered addressC/O CORPORATION SERVICE COMPANY, 19808 Wilmington, United States³
Registered withDivision of Corporations, Department of State, 3964417³

See how the biggest companies compare on our leaderboards

Corporate structure

WebMD is part of a group headed by Internet Brands. 6 entities, 1 country on record. Switch between the flow chart and the network, and select any entity to see its details.

Internet Brands El Segundo
- WebMD New York, New York, United States
  - MedicineNet Subsidiary
  - RxList Subsidiary
  - Frontline Medical Communications Subsidiary
  - WebMD Magazine Owned
- FlyerTalk Subsidiary · California, United States

Built from parent and subsidiary links from GLEIF, the Global Legal Entity Identifier Foundation (CC0); subsidiaries, stakes and holdings from Wikidata (CC0); major holders from Schedules 13D and 13G. Each entity in the chart links to its source.

What it owns

What WebMD reports owning in its annual reports to the SEC: buildings, land and equipment, real estate and locations, investments, intangible assets and inventory, at the end of its latest fiscal year and a year before.

Stakes and holdings (Wikidata)

MedicineNet
RxList
WebMD
WebMD Magazine

Things Wikidata records the company as owning, with the share when stated.¹

The story

WebMD is best known as a health information services website, which publishes content regarding health and health care topics, including a symptom checklist, pharmacy information, drugs information, and blogs of physicians with specific topics, and provides a place to store personal medical information. URAC, the Utilization Review Accreditation Commission, has accredited WebMD's operations continuously since 2001 regarding everything from proper disclosures and health content to security and privacy.

The company reported $705 million in revenue for the year 2016. In 2017, Internet Brands, a company owned by private-equity firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR) agreed to purchase WebMD Health Corporation for approximately $2.8 billion.

In May 2021, WebMD acquired the print magazine and website for patients with ADHD and parents of children with ADHD, ADDitude. In August 2022, WebMD acquired the leading French medical news site Jim.fr.

From Wikipedia’s article on WebMD, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.⁵

Subsidiaries and ownership

Parent company

Internet Brands

Subsidiaries

Frontline Medical Communications since 2019

Also owns

MedicineNet
RxList
WebMD
WebMD Magazine

From Wikidata.¹

Acquisitions

2019Acquired Frontline Medical Communications¹

Controversies and legal

Criticism

Writing in The New York Times Magazine in 2011, Virginia Heffernan criticized WebMD for biasing readers toward drugs that are sold by the site's pharmaceutical sponsors, even when they are unnecessary. She wrote that WebMD "has become permeated with pseudo-medicine and subtle misinformation."

Julia Belluz of Vox criticized WebMD in 2016 for encouraging hypochondria and for promoting treatments for which evidence of safety and effectiveness is weak or non-existent, such as green coffee supplements for weight loss, vagus nerve stimulation for depression, and fish-oil/omega-3 supplements for high cholesterol.

In 2016, a survey of doctors found WebMD and its sister company Medscape to have incomplete medical information lacking depth and also numerous cases of misinformation on their sites. A study of Medscape and WebMD also found both services to lack neutrality and exhibiting bias potentially based on very high payments (compared to their industry competitors) from the pharmaceutical industry.