Choose the Right Covid-19 Test for Your Needs

If you haven’t had a Covid-19 test lately, you may need one soon. But which one?

Last year, there were often long wait times to get a doctor’s appointment for a Covid-19 test and even longer delays to get the results. Here is the good news: Testing options are now more plentiful, often easier to perform and deliver faster results. The bad news: The choices can be more confusing and, with the spread of the Covid-19 Delta variant, some are in short supply.

Do you opt for a nasal swab that is sent to a lab and may be more precise but takes days to get results or the one you can pick up at the drugstore, perform at home and get results in 15 minutes? Should you choose the type of test that usually detects Covid-19 earlier in the infection? Or the one that might not catch it until you are contagious?

Sometimes “the best test is the test you can get,” says Dr. John Brooks, chief medical officer of the Covid-19 response at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The highly infectious Delta variant, which has been driving up transmissions including breakthrough infections among some already vaccinated, has prompted a run on some of the Covid-19 test kits that became available in April and has lengthened some wait times. Earlier this week Abbott Laboratories ’ two-test BinaxNow Self Test, which sells for $20 to $24, was temporarily out of stock on Amazon.com , and the Ellume Covid-19 home test kit was unavailable there.