Both Eylea and Avastin may be given as an injection into the eye (called an intravitreal injection) to treat neovascular (wet) age-related macular degeneration (AMD).

They are both VEGF inhibitors and work by blocking VEGF, a signal protein that stimulates the growth of new blood vessels. Abnormal blood vessel growth from existing blood vessels (called angiogenesis) is associated with the progression of degenerative eye conditions such as neovascular AMD.

The differences between them are:

• Eylea is FDA-approved to treat neovascular AMD but the use of Avastin for this purpose is off-label (not FDA approved), although Avastin intravitreal injections have been used for neovascular AMD since 2005. Eylea is also FDA-approved to treat preterm infants with retinopathy of prematurity
• Eylea is significantly more expensive than Avastin. One injection of Eylea costs around $2000 compared to $100 for an injection of Avastin
• One retrospective analysis (Cao et al, 2022) reported that people administered Eylea were almost 3 times more likely to be weaned off treatment (also known as a treatment holiday) due to eye stabilization than those treated with Avastin (43% vs. 15% respectively). However, the study was not randomized nor blinded and could be subject to inherent bias that could have influenced the outcomes (for example, retina specialists holding the belief that Eylea is more potent).