OBJECTIVES: Migraine is one of the most common diseases worldwide and, importantly, a major cause of disability. The purpose of this study was to estimate the annual cost of migraine from the perspective of reimbursement agency. METHODS: For determining the migraine economic burden, Cost of Illness methodology is used. After calculating direct and indirect costs, weight in frequency, determining the annual costs per patient, total cost is reached on the basis of prevalence. An expert panel has been organized for the use of health resources. For the direct costs, patients' applications to hospital yearly, laboratory and imaging tests implemented during application, hospitalizations and treatments, medicines, side effects and complications are evaluated. Indirect costs are calculated that belong to patient such as productivity loss. In addition, transportation costs and out of pocket payment are considered in indirect cost calculation. RESULTS: The prevalence of migraine is estimated as 16.4% in Turkey. Annually direct and non direct medical cost of treatment of migraine per patient is $476.11. Annually indirect cost of migraine per patient is $143.43 and total cost is $619.55. Considering total patient number of migraine is 13,119,198 and half of them get diagnose. Thus, total direct cost is determined as $3,123,136,207.27 from the payer perspective. According to the expert panel data, appproximately 34.0% patients got sick days report as 30 days in a year, all patients lose their work times for treatment in hospital as 8 days in a year and 7.5% traveled to other cities for treatment. Hence, total indirect cost is calculated as $940,849,778.60 resulting in total migraine cost for Turkey including direct costs to be $4,063,985,985.88. CONCLUSIONS: Migraine is an important economic burden for Turkey. These data demonstrate the importance of the indiviual and societal impact of migraine and illustrate the need for improved strategies to target migraine treatment.