Unobrush Review

Consider these other brushes

Unobrush is one of a select few products that fall under the category of mouthpiece toothbrushes.

Similar products are listed within our mouthpiece toothbrush article, but currently, I am unable to recommend any at the time of review.

Whilst not a mouthpiece toothbrush, you might want to consider Triple Bristle. Designed more like a regular toothbrush, it is able to clean 3 surfaces of the teeth at one time.

However, a better investment would be in the Oral-B Pro 2 2500, which we rate as the best electric toothbrush, all things considered.

A cost effective, strong performing electric toothbrush, the small round head cleans the teeth really well.

It boasts a 2 week battery life, a built-in timer and a pacer to encourage brushing for the right amount of time. It comes with a pressure sensor to stop you from brushing too hard.

And most importantly, when used correctly, it cleans the teeth really well, something Unobrush does not do.

Unobrush in depth review

Unobrush is a mouthpiece style toothbrush.

If you are not familiar with this type of product, our detailed guide to mouthpiece toothbrushes explains everything.

The key thing you need to know is that they are a new type of oral care product. One day they could be an alternative to the regular manual or electric toothbrush.  

The intention is that they aim to clean multiple tooth surfaces at the same time, preferably all of them.  This is different to the 1 surface approach that a regular toothbrush offers.

In line with this, these products aim to reduce the reliance on the user to use the correct brushing technique.  The bristles are angled perfectly at the teeth and gumline.

The intended end result is clean, healthy teeth and gums, brushed in less time and with more consistency than regular toothbrushes. But currently, none of them achieve this to a high enough standard to replace a regular toothbrush.

Kickstarter/Indiegogo campaign

Kickstarter and Indiegogo are websites, more typically referred to as crowdfunding platforms.

They are essentially an online marketplace that allows product creators to get financial backing from members of the public to try and make their products and services a reality.  

The backers (the people who part with money) get discounted or early access to the product/service when it is available in exchange for investing in the creator. 

There are pros and cons to these platforms, which I am not discussing here.  But, in short, the backer is taking a risk by investing their money. 

The reason these platforms exist is that in many instances, the creators wouldn’t get or choose not to get backing from more traditional routes such as banks.

Unobrush launched on Kickstarter on October 22nd 2018.

It followed in the success of Amabrush, a mouthpiece toothbrush successfully funded in 2017. 

Come November 22nd 2018, Unobrush had been successfully funded with 12,375 backers.  

It then went on to raise further funds from another 3,696 backers on Indegogo.

In total Unobrush raised £1,149,473 GBP/$1.6 million from 16,344 backers.

The campaign page claimed the following:

UNOBRUSH is the world’s smartest toothbrush that delivers a refreshing clean to your mouth, teeth, and gums.

It combines an:

– ergonomic mouthpiece

– patent-pending 360-degree wrapping UNOfoam

– pulsing sonic vibrations

Enabling it to reach 99.9% of the surfaces and crevices on your teeth – cleaning your entire mouth in just 6 seconds.

You can see this and other remarks about the product here.

Unobrush was due to ship in August 2019.

Like many crowdfunding journeys, things do not always go to plan.

It began shipping over 18 months later in Q2 2021.

The final product is quite different from the original concept.  The creators claim that this was necessary.  Examples of differences include a nylon-bristled U shape mouthpiece as opposed to foam.  The cleaning mode runs for 10, rather than 6 seconds.

I am not here to comment on the journey from crowdfunding to where we are today.

 I am focused on reviewing the final product that I have here.

However, understandably, many backers are extremely disappointed because the product is significantly different to what was promised.  And, the result is the poor performing product we have here.

This is not a clinical study

I want to be very clear that this is a review and not a clinical study.

We have not subjected Unobrush to testing under controlled conditions using tried and tested scientific approaches.

This review is written from the perspective of an everyday consumer/user of this product, just like you might be.

The slight difference being that I, Jon, have used over 150 different electric toothbrushes over the last 5+ years.  I have documented my opinions on many of them on this website. I, therefore, have more insight and experience than most into electric and mouthpiece style toothbrushes.

However, as we do with all mouthpiece toothbrushes we test, we did perform a plaque disclosing test.

You can see the before and after results below.

The results speak for themselves.  

There is a large amount of disclosing agent left on the teeth and at the gumline.

It is safe to say this does not perform as anyone would expect.

If you use it for 3 times as long as recommended (30 seconds). It does remove a little more, but still far from enough.

The mouthpiece / brush head is painful to fit in the mouth 

Getting straight to the point here.  This brush head is terrible.

Actually trying to fit this brush head in the mouth is painful.

I just about managed to get it in.  I could feel it putting pressure on the back of my mouth.  Trying to form a seal over it to clean properly was almost impossible.

With repeated attempts over 10 days, it became a little less painful in the mouth. I still could not form a proper seal around it. I suspect I built up more of a tolerance for the discomfort than anything.

I certainly couldn’t properly adopt the brushing technique that is advised.

Everyone’s mouths are slightly different, but there is no way that this is a 1 size fits all mouthpiece.  

I don’t know how they came to the conclusion that this was suitably sized for the vast majority of people. Who or what was this tested on?

I am a 5 foot 10” tall male of average build.  I would suggest I fit the profile of your average user fairly well.  

My 5 foot 3” tall fiance could not even get this in her mouth. She gagged trying to do so.

I thought the Amabrush mouthpiece was large when I tested that, but this is bigger.

Now to be fair it is of a similar width to Amabrush, but the significant difference is the depth of the head.  It is almost double.

It measures in at 78x73x29.5mm.

To make things worse there is absolutely no flex/give in the brush head.  It is as rigid as can be.  Even with a really firm hand grip around it, I achieve the most marginal of flexing, followed by a cracking sound.

So then to the bristles, all 19,200. 600 per tooth. With that many, it should clean the teeth as well as a dentist.  Sadly not.

These are the worst bristles I have seen or experienced on a toothbrush. Period.

They are extremely stiff and coarse.  Are you aware of nail brushes? They are a type of handheld brush you use to remove dirt from under the fingernails.  They have short stiff bristles.  This is exactly what the bristles on Unobrush feel like.

Or to explain it another way, they are as stiff as the bristles you will find on the roller head of a vacuum cleaner.

Essentially these are the very bristles you don’t want on a toothbrush.

They are nylon, which does clean the teeth better than silicone bristles.  So, some credit to Unobrush here.  Y-Brush is the best mouthpiece toothbrush I have tested to date.  It performed better than expected because of the nylon bristles.

Such stiff bristles can do damage to the tooth and gum surfaces.  

The amount of damage I may have done to my teeth during testing was bound to be limited because the majority didn’t even reach the gumline.

Because the head is so large I really struggled to get the right fit and have my teeth bite into the head as you are supposed to.  I know despite countless attempts I rarely got my teeth perfectly positioned.

Without moving the brush head, it certainly wouldn’t have cleaned a large proportion of my teeth.

As I will explain shortly, the technique is to move the brush head around the mouth. But, my ability to do this was limited by the size.  Even when at the limits of my discomfort, I could not seem to ensure a good contact between the bristles and my gumline.

The plaque disclosing tests really speak for themselves.

I want to be enthusiastic about this type of product.  I think it could be the future. But, even if miraculously this had cleaned the teeth better, I simply would not want to use it because of the discomfort and the abrasive bristles.

I simply don’t know how or why Unobrush decided to proceed with this mouthpiece.  They would have been better waiting even longer to ship a product with a head that was more accommodating to most.

You should never buy a product on the promise of future updates or changes.  However, for what it is worth, Unbobrush have been very keen to share that they are continually improving.  

Continual improvement is commendable and essential in this space.

They are already working on a new, smaller brush head, with softer bristles.  This has to be a good thing.

You can see the new brush head in the image render below that Unbobrush provided.  It looks like it could give a better bristle coverage, but it doesn’t look all that much thinner. I wonder if this will pose much of an issue.  Possibly not, if it is not as tall.  

But, if they are already working on a new head, yet prepared to ship this existing head, I struggle to comprehend what this says about the company.

They knew the mouthpiece was bad but shipped it anyway.  After an 18 month delay, what are a few more months to get a better head?

If it was to satisfy the frustrated backers, at least promise to send a new brush head to them when available.

Even as I write this review, you can buy the Unobrush (as per this review) on their website with this awful brush head.

Unobrush raised £1.8 million and have had products like Amabrush, Y-Brush, V-White, Autobrush and many more to base their designs on and perfect it.

I am not suggesting it is simple. With that amount of capital, it can buy you the expertise to do better than this.

V-White was the worst mouthpiece toothbrush I have ever used prior to this.  Although V-White cleaned no better than not brushing your teeth at all (according to this study) at least it fitted in the mouth without discomfort.  It felt like you would expect a mouthpiece toothbrush to.

The base module/handpiece is nicely designed but cleans poorly

The base module or the handpiece as it might otherwise be known contains the motor that actually drives the movements in the brush head.

Now, to be fair to Unobrush, this is quite nicely designed.

I like the profile of the handpiece.  I like the simple button placement.

It feels fairly solid.

I like the matte coating to the base module.

It looks modern and clean and the grey and white colour scheme works well.

Aside from the power button, there are no other controls on the unit.  

At the top is the attachment for the brush head. It is a rectangular shaft a few millimetres wide and thick that the brush head slides onto.

This shaft is plastic.

Now, I am no engineer, but I feel this might be a weak point.  The best quality electric toothbrushes tend to have metal shafts.

In fact, I have seen someone showing that theirs has already broken.

Press the button and you launch into the 1 and only cleaning mode, which lasts for 10 seconds.

At the end of the 10 seconds, it automatically powers itself off.

The built-in rechargeable battery should last for up to 6 months on a single charge.

When powered on, a noisy motor kicks in.

It operates at around 80dB.

This is louder than any other electric toothbrush I have used.  It sounds a bit like a jackhammer.

The motor movement causes the plastic shaft to shake rapidly from side to side.  This causes a vibrational movement through the whole brush head, which in turn creates the cleaning action.

I can’t deny that this motion is powerful.

The brush head moves rapidly and much more than any other mouthpiece toothbrush I have tried.  You would have thought, given the amount of movement that it would achieve better cleaning results.

Power doesn’t equal clean teeth.

There are clear quality issues

For any new company like Unobrush, there are going to be some quality and manufacturing issues.

The severity of these will vary.

It was however rather alarming when prior to the review I was sent videos of the brush head literally vibrating itself off of the base module.

I can confirm 2 of the units we received did just this.

This is worrying and a potential danger to users.

The actual possible damage it could cause is likely limited, but it could and this should not happen.

When I tested V-White, I found that its mouthpiece could come loose too.  However, it didn’t actually come off on its own.

Without any prompting, during our testing, we received notification from Unobrush that they had become aware of this issue.  They suggest this affected a select batch of which ours were included.  Without request or prompting, they sent us another unit.

In full transparency though, this unit did not appear to have the same issue.  The fit of the head onto the shaft was much tighter.  Thus, in fairness to Unobrush, this might not be as ‘big’ an issue as I am suggesting.  I feel it is only right to make you aware of it though.

With the other 2 units, you need little force to push on or pull off the head.

Even with this ‘fixed’ variant, the head isn’t as secure as I would like or expect.  I have never used a product where the head comes off with so little force.  

The cleaning experience is awkward and ineffective

A mouthpiece toothbrush is designed to clean all the teeth at the same time. In theory, at least the approach for using them should be less technique sensitive than a manual or electric toothbrush.

However, to date, in order to achieve better results, you often have to move the brush from side to side, up and down or in circular motions.

This applies with Unobrush.

It is painful to get in the mouth at first.  After trying for 10+ days I can’t say it got easier.  I feel I just became slightly more tolerant.

To actually get close to reaching the gumline, I had to open my mouth wide and focus the brush head on the upper and then the lower teeth.

The problem here is this is awkward and I then found I tended to dribble a bit from my bottom lip. 

I certainly couldn’t achieve the amount of movement I would have liked to, in an effort to drive better results.

When powered on, the vibration through the base module and the head is quite intense.  You need to keep a firm hold on the base module.

I actually felt that when in the mouth the intensity of the vibration and movement was suppressed.  Some of that being absorbed by my cheeks and mouth due to the tight fit.

I know others have reported the sensation being very intense and even inducing a headache or making them feel sick.  I personally did not experience this, but I can completely see how this is possible for some.

The upshot here is try as I might, the overall cleaning experience was poor.  I could tell this just by looking at the position of the brush head in relation to the teeth and gums, but the plaque disclosing tests confirm this.

Maybe the new brush head will resolve this to some extent, but as it stands, this is not good.

The charging stand/uv sanitiser is nicely designed, but I am not convinced by it

Most electric toothbrushes charge wirelessly. Rarely is there a need to physically connect a charging/power cable into the toothbrush?

Unobrush is no different.

The provided charging stand comes complete with UV sanitiser.

I have to hand it to Unobrush, it is a nice looking stand.

The base module sits in front of the sanitiser.

The sanitiser is an oval-ish shape.  White in colour, it stands about 11cm/4.3” tall.

The base of the stand is grey in colour.

The white and grey theme is consistent with the Unobrush itself.

On the base are 4 large rubber feet to keep it secure on a countertop.

On the rear is a USB Type C charging port.

In the box is a USB Type A to USB Type C cable for powering this. 

You do not get a USB power brick/plug adapter.

I like a great deal that this has a USB Type C connector.  It is very current and not dated like some other toothbrushes.

The sanitiser is supposed to rid the brush head/mouthpiece of bacteria, by radiating UltraViolet light onto it.

The sanitiser functions when the unit is connected to power and the lid is closed.  It runs for 10 minutes

The need for UV sanitising is up for debate.  Many leading dental bodies suggest it is not required, but I see why some desire such.  

As I have suggested this is not a clinical study, but I suspect the UV sanitiser does very little.

The reason being, the position of the UV light in relation to the bristles on the mouthpiece when in the unit.

The bulbs are on the bottom facing up at the lid of the module.  The mouthpiece sits between these bulbs.  You therefore essentially have a channel of UV light passing from the bottom to the top of the module which the brush head does not interrupt.

The light may make more contact with the bristles closest to the head, but I can’t imagine it is very effective at the top.

It is difficult to explain.  The images perhaps give you a little more of an idea.

In addition to this, there is no reflective material on the inside of the module to bounce this UV light into the bristles.

Compared to other UV sanitizers I have tested, they are designed in such a way that the UV light is more intensely focused on the bristles.

I feel like this is sanitizing the air around the bristles.  But, I am not an expert, merely stating my opinions.

The packaging is nice, at least

Nailed it.

To be fair, Unobrush have done a nice job with the packaging and unboxing experience.  It has an Apple vibe to it.

The documentation is clear and informative.

The box is a little bigger than I would like, but this is in part due to the bulky UV charging station that is included.

I’m not sure the environmental considerations stack up

Electric toothbrushes are not the most environmentally considerate products. But this is a trade-off, for better oral health that can potentially be included as a result of correct daily use.

Environmental concerns seem to be something that is important to Unborush backers, according to CEO Andres Dierks in this video.

This is in part why the design had to change.

I question whether this mouthpiece brush head is any more or less environmentally considerate.  I don’t know the science, but I would be inclined to think they were similar.

And, if this has been designed to be more environmentally considerate, is there no way to recycle the brush head?  I can’t help but feel these comments are a bit empty.

Don’t get me wrong.  No toothbrush manufacturer has got even close to getting it right yet.  But, if you make it an important principle, do things that genuinely work towards this.

If people are having to buy Unobrush alongside a regular electric toothbrush, overall that is worse for the environment.

A big thanks to

This review would not have been possible without the assistance of Phillip from the USA and Kevin from the UK.

Unobrush was one of the few mouthpiece toothbrushes that we did not back on Kickstarter when it launched.  Therefore when it came to the point of shipping, we were essentially at the back of the queue.

We would likely have paid the full retail price and purchased this ourselves for review.  But, before we took that step, both Philip and Kevin got in touch.  As early backers of Unobrush, they requested we review this product.

Both backers kindly send their units to us. This has enabled us to test Unobrush and write this review.

Electric Teeth has not been paid or received any financial incentive to create this review.  Both Kevin and Philip had no editorial control over the words you see on this page.

Conclusion — save money and buy a regular toothbrush

I am optimistic about the future of mouthpiece toothbrushes.  I want to see them become the norm during my lifetime.

I do believe that these could revolutionise oral care. They make toothbrushing quicker. They can potentially achieve better standards of oral health.  

Unobrush is not yet the product to lead this change.

Given the impressive funding, timeline and existing products, they should have done better.

They have failed to even create a mouthpiece that fits comfortably in the mouth.

Yes, I do believe they are keen to improve and right their wrongs, based on what I am hearing and seeing from the company.

But, what they promise for the future, isn’t what we have now.  

The current product is not a product you want to use.  Even if you can tolerate the shortcomings, it poses a risk to your oral health.  It simply does not clean the teeth anywhere near a satisfactory standard.

Y-Brush is the best mouthpiece to date.

But, in either case, I recommend you stick to a good electric toothbrush like the Pro 2 2500 from Oral-B.  It cleans the teeth well and is a fraction of the price.

Disclaimer

Unobrush is aware that we were writing this review.  They have had no influence on the content and conclusions.  They offered to send a unit for review themselves.  We respectfully declined. Although we did request and receive 2 spare brush heads to help with our testing.

Philip’s Unobrush shipped directly from Unobrush to us.

We gave no feedback or comments on our testing to Unobrush prior to this review.  However, during our testing, they got in contact to say they had discovered some brush heads were not fitting correctly. 

They had identified a bad batch. Philip’s unit (that shipped to us) was said to be one of them.   Without warning or request from ourselves, the company sent an additional unit to us.  The mouthpiece brush head does not come loose on this unit.