Analyzing The Gaps – What Makes A Perfect Smile?

For years, dentists’ posters and toothpaste commercials have shown us what a “perfect” smile should be. To the point that you, as a reader, probably think of a certain image when you hear a “perfect” smile: straight, gleaming white, evenly spaced. A smile so uniform that it could be copy-pasted from one face to another. And maybe it has. Whether on red carpets, Instagram, or reality TV (just look at Love Island, for example), it seems everyone shares the same smile. But at what cost? Experts predict that the veneer market will grow by $1 billion over the next decade.

Have we shifted away from simple accentuation of unique features to the new normal where fitting a standardized ideal is a requirement? Oral health was once associated with health, but now, it's entangled with status, identity, and beauty. In the age of TikTok filters and influencer transformations, cosmetic dentistry, especially veneers, has shifted from being a luxury to a new beauty standard. But what is behind those seemingly perfect white teeth? It is often irreversible procedures, significant costs, and a growing gap between healthy teeth and “beautiful” ones.

While many dentists use social media to promote their cosmetic work with before-and-after pictures to gain attention, Dr. Sara Hahn, a Harvard-trained cosmetic dentist known for her TikTok account @veneercheck, has been raising alarm bells. In her videos analyzing celebrity dental work, she shows the flawless smiles plastered across our screens. Her main critique? These teeth aren’t just enhanced, they’ve been standardized. Hahn says, “There’s no variation of color, there’s no variation of translucency. There’s no surface texture. It’s just stamps”. Her analysis highlights what cosmetic dentistry is facing today: the goal is not uniformity, not individuality. Cultural features like gap teeth, pronounced canines, or slight asymmetries, which were once symbols of charm or luck in many cultures, are now vanishing. Remember the White Lotus star Aimee Lou Wood, who was mocked on SNL for her teeth? She described the decision not to get veneers, despite being bullied for her teeth and her fans constantly commenting on them, as “a bit rebellious”. The message is clear: uniqueness is out, conformity is in.

Braces, while widely normalized and often seen as a standard part of adolescent care, have also become a kind of coming-of-age rite of passage and visual marker for tweens and teens. Yet despite their popularity, they are not without controversy. Some dentists and health care professionals have raised ethical concerns about recommending orthodontic treatment at increasingly younger ages, especially when the rationale appears more cosmetic than medical. A dentist from Texas, known as @truthdds, has created dozens of videos emphasizing the importance of learning about procedures before undergoing orthodontic treatment. There are several cases where patients, despite being advised to get braces, opted out and later saw their teeth shift naturally into a more aligned position with age. Others have voiced concerns about dentists framing braces as necessary when the motivation seems driven by aesthetic ideals rather than functional need.

The way braces are discussed often makes them seem universally accessible, when that is far from the case. In Canada, many insurance plans do not cover braces or other orthodontic treatments, leaving families to pay thousands out of pocket, making it one of the most expensive and often inaccessible forms of dental care. The normalization of braces in oral health often leads to routine or aesthetic-driven recommendations, which can overlook individual needs. Instead, orthodontic care should be context-aware, tailored, and guided by each patient’s unique dental and personal circumstances.

While whitening or orthodontics may accentuate natural features, veneers are a completely different approach. For most people, getting veneers means filing down healthy enamel, an irreversible act. “Once the tooth is shaved,” Hahn says, “it needs to be covered for life”. The risks don’t stop there: Veneers typically last 10–15 years before needing to be replaced, and they can also cause sensitivity, infections, or require root canals. Also, the more times they’re replaced, the more tooth structure is lost, until there’s nothing left to support them. And yet, more and more young people, especially individuals in their 20s, are getting them. According to some dentists, this group now makes up a significant share of redo cases: patients who regret their decision, or whose teeth are breaking down under the strain of repeated cosmetic work. In short, we’re mutilating healthy teeth for an aesthetic trend, one that may not even age well.

While platforms like TikTok and Instagram spread these ideals, they also sell them. Influencers document their smile transformations through vlogs, such as the trending Get Ready With Me videos, and they turn their medical procedures into a public performance. Clinics then post the results, tagged and filtered, and they reach thousands. Even dentist training is shifting; some dentists report that patient demand for cosmetic work is reshaping how young dentists are taught to approach care. So, when patients, especially young teens, come in asking to look like a filtered photo, what happens to informed consent? To ethics?

All of this raises hard questions about what dentistry is for, and who it is for. In Canada and the U.S., dental care already has many accessibility issues, as we discussed in our previous blogs. Millions lack coverage, and essential procedures such as decay and gum disease can be unaffordable. Yet, cosmetic procedures often marked as “smile makeovers” are on the rise, even when they destroy natural teeth.

Cultural perception of dental features also plays a critical role in how we understand beauty and oral health. In many African cultures, features like a gap in the front teeth are celebrated. As Dr. Ade Osinubi writes, this feature, affectionately called èjí in Yoruba, symbolizes beauty and wealth in Nigeria, with some even undergoing procedures to create it. Yet, in Western contexts, these same features are often pathologized or mocked. Osinubi and others interviewed in her piece recall being pressured to conform to Eurocentric dental ideals or being bullied for their naturally occurring gaps. Cosmetic dentistry’s march toward uniformity can erase cultural identity, treating diversity not as a beauty but as something to be fixed.

Authors: Yara Shaban and Ashleen Parmar

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