What is the right way to brush your teeth?

Most of us have been brushing for decades, which is exactly why bad habits creep in. The two most common are brushing too hard and rinsing afterwards — and both undo some of the good you are doing.

Start with the right brush

Soft or extra-soft bristles, always. The Australian Dental Association recommends soft bristles because they are gentler on gums and enamel while cleaning just as effectively.

Medium and firm brushes wear away enamel at the gumline and contribute to gum recession — neither of which grows back. Choose a head small enough to reach behind your back molars, and replace the brush or head every three months, or sooner once the bristles splay.

Use fluoride toothpaste. A pea-sized amount for adults; a rice-grain smear of low-fluoride children's paste for children under six.

Manual or electric?

Both work. A well-used manual brush beats a badly used electric one. That said, for most people an electric brush makes good technique easier to achieve.

If you buy an electric brush, the useful features are the two-minute timer and the pressure sensor. Oscillating-rotating and sonic designs both clean well; the choice between them matters far less than using it twice a day and replacing the head.

Step by step

1. Angle the brush at 45 degrees to the gumline. This is the single most important detail on this page. The junction where tooth meets gum is where plaque accumulates and where gum disease begins, and a brush held flat against the tooth misses it entirely.

2. Outer surfaces. Short, gentle, tooth-wide strokes, or small circles. Work systematically — upper right round to upper left, then the lower arch — so you are not relying on memory for where you have been.

3. Inner surfaces. Same 45-degree angle. For the inside of the front teeth, turn the brush vertically and use the tip; it is an awkward angle and one of the most commonly missed areas.

4. Chewing surfaces. Short back-and-forth strokes over the grooves of the back teeth.

5. Behind the very back teeth. The rear surface of the last molar has no neighbour and gets forgotten constantly. Angle the brush in behind it.

6. Tongue. Gently, back to front. Most of the bacteria behind bad breath live there.

7. Spit out the excess — and do not rinse.

That last step matters more than people realise. Rinsing with water after brushing washes the fluoride straight off your teeth before it has had a chance to work. Spit, and leave it. Avoid mouthwash immediately after brushing too, for the same reason — use it at a different time of day.

With an electric brush, the technique changes: you do not scrub. Place the head on one tooth at a time, let it do the work for a few seconds, then move on. Most people go too fast and press too hard, which is the one thing the brush cannot fix for you.

The order that stops you missing spots

People miss the same places: the inside of the lower front teeth (where tartar builds fastest, because a salivary gland opens right there), the outside of the upper back molars on their dominant-hand side, and behind the last tooth in each arch.

A fixed route fixes most of this. Pick one and never vary it — for example: outside upper, inside upper, outside lower, inside lower, then chewing surfaces, then tongue. It should feel boringly mechanical.

Two minutes, twice a day

Thirty seconds each to the upper left, upper right, lower left and lower right. Almost everyone brushes for less time than they think — use a timer, a song, or an electric brush with a built-in one.

Brush last thing before bed and one other time. The night-time brush is the important one: saliva flow drops while you sleep, so whatever is left on your teeth sits there undiluted for hours.

Brush gently

Plaque is soft. It takes almost no force to remove — the bristle tips reaching the surface do the work, not pressure.

Pressing hard bends the bristles flat so they touch less of the tooth, and over years it wears notches into the enamel at the gumline and pushes gums back. If your brush splays out within a few weeks, you are pressing too hard. Try holding it in your fingertips rather than your fist.

When to brush after eating

Wait about 30 minutes after anything acidic — citrus, wine, soft drink, vinegar, or after vomiting. Acid temporarily softens enamel, and brushing straight away scrubs off the softened layer. Rinse with water and wait.

Choosing a toothpaste

The fluoride is the active part. Almost everything else on the box is marketing.

Charcoal toothpastes are worth a specific warning: many are abrasive, most contain no fluoride, and any whitening effect is surface scrubbing, not a change in tooth colour. The abrasion is permanent; the whiteness is not.

Whitening toothpastes remove surface staining. They do not change the underlying shade of your teeth. See teeth whitening.

Brushing is only part of it

A toothbrush cannot reach between your teeth. Those surfaces are roughly 40% of each tooth, and they are exactly where decay and gum disease most often start.

Clean between your teeth once a day with floss or interdental brushes. If you are going to add one habit to your routine, make it this one rather than a better toothbrush.

Brushing around dental work

Braces. Brush after every meal. Angle the brush above the bracket and then below it, and use an interdental brush under the wire. White marks around brackets are decalcification and they do not wash off later.

Implants. Brush as you would a natural tooth, and clean around the neck of the implant carefully. Gum disease around an implant — peri-implantitis — is the main reason implants are lost, and it is quiet in its early stages.

Crowns and bridges. Brush normally. Under a bridge, use a floss threader or a superfloss to clean beneath the false tooth; nothing else reaches there.

Dentures. Do not use ordinary toothpaste — it is too abrasive for denture acrylic and creates scratches that hold stain. Use a denture brush and denture cleaner, clean over a basin of water so a drop does not break it, and still brush any remaining natural teeth and your gums and tongue.

Dry mouth, from medication, radiotherapy or a medical condition, raises decay risk substantially because saliva is your natural defence. Brushing matters more, not less, and it is worth telling us so we can adjust your recall interval.

Children, by age

• Before the first tooth — wipe the gums with a clean damp cloth
• First tooth to 18 months — brush twice a day with water only, no toothpaste
• 18 months to 6 years — a smear of low-fluoride children's paste. Spit, do not rinse, and do not swallow
• From 6 — standard family fluoride toothpaste, pea-sized
• Supervise until about 8 — children do not have the dexterity before then, however capable they seem. A useful compromise for an older child is: they brush first, you go over it afterwards

See family and children's dentistry.

If brushing is physically hard

Arthritis, tremor, stroke recovery or reduced grip make the standard advice unhelpful. Practical adaptations:

• An electric brush does the movement for you — the single biggest help
• Thicken a manual handle with a foam grip, a bike handlebar grip, or a tennis ball pushed onto it
• Floss holders or interdental brushes instead of string floss
• A carer brushing from behind and slightly above, with the person's head supported, gives far better access than facing them

Tell us, and we will adjust what we recommend to what is actually achievable.

Common mistakes

• Rinsing after brushing
• Scrubbing hard, side to side, with a firm brush
• Skipping the gumline
• Brushing straight after acidic food or drink
• Keeping a brush past the point where the bristles splay
• Missing the inside surfaces and the back of the last molar
• Not cleaning between the teeth at all
• Sharing a brush, or storing brushes touching head to head

If your gums bleed when you brush, that is inflammation, not a reason to stop — brush gently and see us if it does not settle within a week or two.

Questions we are asked

Should I brush before or after breakfast? Either is defensible. If you brush before, you start the day with fluoride on clean teeth. If you brush after, wait thirty minutes when breakfast was acidic — juice, citrus, or a fizzy drink.

Does mouthwash replace brushing? No. It is an optional extra, used at a separate time from brushing. Alcohol-free versions are more comfortable for most people.

How should I store my brush? Upright, in the open air, not touching anyone else's, and not in a sealed container while wet. Closed travel caps grow bacteria.

Should I replace my brush after being unwell? It is a reasonable precaution and costs very little.

My gums have receded. Will they come back? No. That is why the soft brush and light pressure matter so much. What we can do is stop it going further and treat the sensitivity that comes with it.

Is a water flosser as good as floss? It is better than not cleaning between teeth at all, and genuinely useful around braces, bridges and implants. For most people it works best alongside floss or interdental brushes rather than instead of them.

Who provides this here

Victorian Dental Group is a general dental practice in Malvern East. At a check-up and clean we will show you, on your own teeth, where your technique is missing — which is considerably more useful than any general advice on a page. Ask us to. We hold no specialist registration and refer to registered specialists where that is appropriate.

Read more about check-up and hygiene, choosing a toothbrush and toothpaste or flossing.

Victorian Dental Group — 291 Wattletree Road, Malvern East VIC 3145 · (03) 9088 5808 · book online

General information only, not personal dental advice. See our disclaimer.