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What are the principal types of life insurance? There are two major types of life insurance�term and whole life. Whole life is sometimes called permanent life insurance, and it encompasses several subcategories, including traditional whole life, universal life, variable life and variable universal life. In 2003, about 6.4 million individual life insurance policies bought were term and about 7.1 million were whole life. Life insurance products for groups are different from life insurance sold to individuals. The information below focuses on life insurance sold to individuals. Term Term Insurance is the simplest form of life insurance. It pays only if death occurs during the term of the policy, which is usually from one to 30 years. Most term policies have no other benefit provisions. There are two basic types of term life insurance policies�level term and decreasing term. Level term means that the death benefit stays the same throughout the duration of the policy. Decreasing term means that the death benefit drops, usually in one-year increments, over the course of the policy�s term. In 2003, virtually all (97 percent) of the term life insurance bought was level term. For more on the different types of term life insurance, click here. Whole Life/Permanent Whole life or permanent insurance pays a death benefit whenever you die�even if you live to 100! There are three major types of whole life or permanent life insurance�traditional whole life, universal life, and variable universal life, and there are variations within each type. In the case of traditional whole life, both the death benefit and the premium are designed to stay the same (level) throughout the life of the policy. The cost per $1,000 of benefit increases as the insured person ages, and it obviously gets very high when the insured lives to 80 and beyond. The insurance company could charge a premium that increases each year, but that would make it very hard for most peop