Smileie Review: Everything You Need to Know

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Straight teeth are a serious confidence boost, and today’s clear aligner companies are making them more accessible than ever. Smileie is in a wave of new online brands that claim to maximize that accessibility by offering clear aligner treatment you can complete completely at home.

They haven’t been in business as long as some competitors, but their pricing, convenience, and new hybrid “Smileie Pro” option certainly make them seem promising. To help you decide if they’re right for you, here’s a comprehensive review of Smileie’s services.

What is Smileie?

If you’ve seen or read about Invisalign, you likely know how clear aligners work. Basically, the shape of each tray places force on the teeth, slowly shifting them. Each aligner set has a slightly different shape, and you’ll wear each one 22+ hours per day (or 10+ hours for their Nighttime Aligners). But unlike in-office treatments (Invisalign, etc.), Smileie doesn’t require any trips to the dentist. On the flip side, their fully remote treatment isn’t suitable for more complex misalignments or jaw issues, and doesn’t include regular in-person oversight.

Smileie Pro

It’s tough to replace hands-on care from a dentist, and for people who want a little more face-to-face treatment, Smileie introduced their Pro model. This is a hybrid treatment that starts with an exam and teeth scan—to check your dental health and see whether Smileie will work for you—then uses a remote monitoring system from DentalMonitoring to track your progress.

It’s more expensive than their fully remote treatment ($1,499 vs. $849), but we think it’s worth the extra money. Not only can an initial dental exam identify and address issues like cavities that might throw off treatment down the line, but regular monitoring helps ensure that your teeth are moving as expected.

How Do I Get Started?

Kicking off your Smileie treatment is pretty simple. And if you go with their standard, remote model, you can complete the entire process from home. Here’s a step-by-step walkthrough.

• Take their smile quiz: This includes a few basic questions about your misalignment, previous orthodontic treatment, and overall oral health. Assuming your answers don’t disqualify you for treatment, they’ll invite you to place your order.
• Choose your treatment: You can pick between their regular, all-day treatment, or a nighttime plan that requires 10+ hours of overnight wear. Certain people can also choose to straighten just one arch instead of both. However, this might affect your bite, so it’s not for everyone.
• Complete an impression kit: A few days after you pay, your impression kit will arrive. You’ll need to make molds of your teeth and take some diagnostic photos. Then, email the photos to the company and mail out the impressions.
• Review your treatment plan: Smileie’s lab will review your impressions and photos, then decide whether to green-light your treatment. If their aligners won’t work for you, they’ll let you know and refund the full cost of treatment. Otherwise, Smileie will email you a 3D treatment preview. If you don’t like it, Smileie will issue a full refund. But if you do, they’ll manufacture your aligners and ship them in as little as 2–3 weeks.

What About Smileie Pro?

People who choose Smileie Pro won’t complete an impression kit. Instead, they’ll book an appointment at their nearest provider. There are currently 25 partnering dental offices across the US. At the appointment, the dentist will examine your teeth, take intraoral scans, and send off your info to determine whether you’re a good candidate for treatment. If so, and you agree to treatment, you’ll receive your aligners and dental monitoring package in the mail.

Before you commit, visit your dentist.

Even if you go with Smileie’s remote option, we recommending visiting your regular dentist for an exam and X-rays. No one knows your teeth like them, and they’ll let you know if you have any cavities, gingivitis, or under-the-surface issues to address beforehand.

Then, to make sure you’re all set, read over our seven-step checklist on preparing for at-home teeth straightening.

Our Review of Smileie Clear Aligners

Smileie Overall Score: 4.28/5
Average Overall Score: 4.23/5

While they might not yet have decades of experience, Smileie is one of the most affordable clear aligner treatments available. Pair those prices with their multiple treatment models, free whitening and retainers, and financing plans, and if you ask us, you’ve got a fairly attractive treatment option. But like any other treatment, it has downsides too.

Overall, we scored Smileie 4.28/5 based on our five review criteria—scope of treatment, affordability, convenience, appearance, and customer experience. Here’s a rundown of its biggest advantages and disadvantages.

Scope of Treatment

No in-person care means fully remote aligners can’t correct complex misalignments. Why? During office visits, dentists can add attachments, aligner modifications, and treatments like IPR to help make more intricate dental shifts. Since Smileie’s treatment is either completely or mostly remote, it’s restricted to simpler, milder issues.

Smileie can only treat mild and moderate cases of crowding and spacing, along with some mild bite issues.

Not only that, but like their at-home aligner peers, Smileie focuses mainly on cosmetic concerns in the front six teeth of either arch. They do not move the molars and only occasionally move the premolars. If your misalignment is severe, involves the molars, or affects the jawbone, you’ll need either an in-person treatment like Invisalign, or potentially even braces.

Within this mild-to-moderate range, Smileie’s website says they can address:

• Crowding
  Spacing
• Overbite
• Underbite
• Crossbite
• Overjet

Just keep in mind that the bite issues listed here are typically very mild ones that only affect the teeth, not the jaw.

The company only treats people 18 and older. If you are missing more than three teeth per arch, you might not be suitable for treatment. Additionally, we strongly recommend resolving any active tooth decay and gum disease before beginning aligner treatment.

The only way to know if you’re a good candidate is by submitting an impression kit or scheduling an office visit.

Before they determine whether their aligners will work for you, Smileie needs to get their eyes on your teeth. You’ve got two options. If you’ve selected their fully remote treatment, you’ll most likely need to order and complete an impression kit. Smileie also has a scanning center where you can get an intraoral scan, but it’s in Flagstaff, AZ. If you’re not around there, you’ll be making impressions. Anyone who chooses Smileie Pro will instead book their consultation and exam at a local provider, who will take scans and send them to Smileie for evaluation.

Smileie’s team will review your impressions or scans and determine whether their treatment can work for you. If so, they’ll use your images to create a custom treatment plan. If not, they’ll refund the full amount of your purchase.

Frequent virtual check-ins help Smileie’s team keep your treatment on track throughout the process.

During your treatment, you’ll be required to submit photos of your teeth every two weeks, so Smileie’s team can see how your teeth are progressing. They’ll use these images to determine whether you’re ready to move on to your next set of aligners. If your teeth aren’t moving as planned, they may tell you to continue wearing your current set for slightly longer.

Two-week intervals are more frequent than some of Smileie’s competitors, who require virtual check-ins every 4–6 weeks instead. And some at-home aligner brands don’t require patients to check in at all during treatment. That means they’ll be monitoring your progress more often than other treatments.

If you go with Smileie Pro, you’ll get special virtual monitoring products and an app, created by Dental Monitoring—a large, widely trusted teledentistry company.

Smileie Pro doesn’t increase the scope of treatment, but it adds an extra layer of safety and consistency.

Smileie Pro doesn’t usually treat a wider range of dental misalignments than Smileie’s standard treatment. According to the company’s support team, Smileie Pro dentists may use attachments or interproximal reduction (IPR), but it’s still just for mild or moderate cases.

However, its in-person appointment(s) and more robust monitoring can help deliver more reliable outcomes. Visiting a dentist at the beginning of treatment will ensure you don’t have cavities or other conditions that might affect the way your teeth move. Plus, intensive remote monitoring will help make sure you’re on track every step of the way.

Affordability

A major part of Smileie’s appeal is its price, which is significantly less than in-office treatments like Invisalign, and even beats many of their fully remote competitors too. Not only that, but they offer some enticing free extras and helpful financing plans too.

You’ll pay $849 for Smileie’s regular treatment, $899 for their nighttime-only option, and $1,499 for Smileie Pro.

Smileie charges a flat rate for treatment; no matter how complex your case is or how many aligners you need, if you are approved for treatment, you pay the same price as everyone else. These rates are thousands less than Invisalign, which often costs $3,000–$8,000. And even among other at-home aligner companies, it’s still a pretty good deal. NewSmile’s non-sale price, for example, is $1,595, while AlignerCo is $995.

The sticker price includes your impression kit and full aligner kit, plus a whitening kit and two sets of aftercare retainers (many companies just include one set).

Smileie offers single-arch treatment at lower prices, plus sales and other discounts.

Some people only have misalignments on one dental arch, and these people might be candidates for aligners on just their top or bottom teeth. Granted, not many people are suitable for single-arch treatment, since adjusting just one arch can throw off your bite. However, if you are, you’ll get a discounted treatment: $699 for a standard plan or $799 for nighttime aligners.

Plus, Smileie has a $50 discount for students and members of the military, and they run frequent sales that can drop their prices by as much as $100.

Insurance plans rarely cover at-home aligner treatments, but some might provide coverage.

Smileie says they’ll provide all the paperwork you need—including detailed receipts and insurance billing codes—to file a claim with your insurance. They still might not cover your treatment, but you’ll need to check with your provider to find out for sure.

If not, you still have options. HSAs and FSAs can also help pay for treatment. While some plans won’t let you use their funds for at-home aligners, others will. Contact your account administrator to find out for sure.

Payment Plans

Smileie understands that not everyone can afford the cost of treatment outright. That’s why they offer financing through Affirm. It may require a credit check, and the terms will vary depending on the payment plan you choose, but some plans are interest free, which can make treatment much more accessible. Their website does not list the details for their nighttime plan but since this treatment costs more, expect the financing terms to be slightly higher as well.

Convenience

You know what they say: Time is money. And many adults don’t have a lot of time to spare. That’s part of what has drawn so many people to at-home aligners. Without office visits, it’s much less of a time commitment than traditional orthodontic treatment. Like most of their fully remote competitors, Smileie capitalizes on this advantage by offering a couple ways to make treatment more convenient, while still leaving the door open for in-person care.

If you choose Smileie’s regular at-home treatment, you’ll most likely need to complete an impression kit to get started.

This involves creating molds of your teeth using special putties, then sending them back to Smileie. Making dental molds can be tough if you’ve never done it before—dentists have to go through specific training to get it right—and if the molds aren’t accurate enough, you may have to repeat the process multiple times. That’s why some people find this process somewhat challenging (and messy).

Smileie has one physical location in Flagstaff, AZ, where a trained staff member will take intraoral scans of your teeth instead. However, this is the only location, so if you live elsewhere, you’ll need to use an impression kit.

Despite the learning curve, impression kits can be convenient in the sense that you can complete the entire process from home. You might have to do it a couple times, but you can handle everything by mail.

After you review and approve your treatment plan, Smileie says it takes 2–3 weeks to produce and deliver your clear aligners.

After you see your treatment plan, you might be itching to start wearing your aligners—and Smileie has a quicker turnaround time than many other brands. Some competitors can take 5+ weeks to manufacture and mail aligners, while Smileie might take half that time.

Smileie says their average treatment time is 4–6 weeks, but this is because they typically only treat mild misalignments.

Most at-home aligner companies say their customers complete treatment in just a few months, while Invisalign can take a year or longer. However, that’s not typically not because their aligners move the teeth faster than Invisalign. Rather, it’s often because they only accept mild and moderate cases, which take less time to treat. Invisalign and braces can take on more severe misalignments, so their treatment times are often longer.

That said, Smileie’s 4–6 month average timeline is pretty similar to most other fully remote clear aligner brands.

Anyone who doesn’t want to wear their aligners during the day can opt for Smileie’s Nighttime Aligners

Wearing aligners 22+ hours per day isn’t appealing to everyone, especially people who need to talk a lot or attend constant meetings during the day. That’s why some at-home aligner companies—including Smileie—have introduced nighttime-only alternatives. They say you only need to wear these aligners for 10+ hours per day, typically overnight.

Because your teeth want to shift back whenever you’re not wearing your aligners, nighttime treatment increases the risk of soreness, and it can cause root injury in rare cases. Plus, it extends the overall treatment timeline to 6–8 months—but the tradeoff is that you won’t need to wear aligners to work, school, social gatherings, or anywhere else.

Appearance

Most adults don’t want brackets and wires. It’s why clear aligners have become so popular. And even though all clear aligners are barely visible, there are slight variations in different brands’ materials and design.

Smileie uses a clear, translucent plastic in their aligners and cuts them straight across the top.

Some companies use frosted, textured aligner plastic, while others use a completely translucent one. Smileie is the latter. Whether this makes your aligners more or less visible depends on who you ask. Some people think that frosted plastic actually matches real tooth surfaces better, since they’re naturally slightly matte. Smooth, translucent aligners, they say, might reflect light in and look artificially shiny. Other people, however, like the clarity and little bit of extra shine these aligners provide. It all comes down to your personal preferences.

Smileie also cuts their aligners straight across the top instead of trimming them to match your gum line. This might make them slightly more noticeable, but some companies say it can also increase their power by anchoring the aligners to your gums.

You won’t have any attachments on your Smileie aligners.

The in-person care involved with brands like Invisalign allow dentists to outfit patients’ aligners with elastics, bite ramps, and buttons that attach directly to the teeth. These attachments may improve the aligners’ orthodontic movements, but it can also make them more noticeable. This isn’t an issue with Smileie, since their standard treatment doesn’t use attachments.

Smileie Pro treatment might include attachments, according to a representative from the company, but they’re not necessary for every case.

Like most other aligners, Smileie is reasonably stain-resistant—but you should still take precautions.

Clear aligners are pretty tough, and many can even stand up to the force of chewing food. But that doesn’t necessarily mean you should eat and drink while wearing them, because they can still get stained. That’s especially true when drinking dark liquids like coffee, tea, or red wine, or eating pigmented foods like berries or tomato sauce.

Customer Experience

Details about prices, procedures, and company backgrounds can provide some reassurance—but what if you need assistance during treatment? What if something goes wrong or you have a question? That’s where customer support comes in. It appears that Smileie provides solid support, although they’ve also collected some mixed customer reviews.

You can contact Smileie in the same ways you would contact most other remote aligner companies.

Their support team is available by phone during their regular business hours—Monday–Friday 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM CST—and by email as well. On top of that, they have a chat feature on their website, which is available any time. We tried it out ourselves, and the responses were both prompt and helpful. This is pretty similar to what you’d get with most other companies.

If you go with Smileie Pro, you can also send messages through the Dental Monitoring App, which is also where you’ll upload photos of your teeth for feedback.

The company will offer refunds in certain cases, and refinements if you’re dissatisfied with your results—but you have to meet a specific set of requirements.

Smileie’s guarantee says that they will refund your purchase if you complete the impression kit and they determine you’re not a suitable candidate for treatment. Although that refund will exclude the cost of the impression kit itself ($49.99). They will also issue a refund (minus the impression kit), if you see your treatment preview and decide not to continue. After you approve your treatment plan, however, you’re ineligible for refunds.

For people who reach the end of their treatment, but their teeth don’t match the treatment preview, Smileie may provide refinement aligners for free, but only if you have:

• Worn your aligners for at least 22 hours per day, or 8–10 hours for nighttime aligners.
• Uploaded progress photos to the patient portal every 14 days.
• Properly stored your aligners throughout treatment.
• Avoided unnecessary dental procedures during treatment.
• Maintained excellent oral hygiene.
• Consistently used your retainer after treatment.

If you followed all these guidelines, and you’re still not happy with your results, contact Smileie and you might get some additional aligners.

What Are Customers Saying?

As a slightly newer company, Smileie doesn’t have a ton of customer reviews yet, but of the ones we could find, many are positive. However, many of the positive reviews were from people fairly early in their treatment—including some who had only completed the impression kit—so it’s difficult to assess the customer experience from start to finish.

Additionally, some customers have reported dissatisfaction with their results, delayed customer service, and difficulty getting a refund. That said, Smileie’s positive reviews still far outweigh their negative ones.

Smileie Comparisons

Here’s how Smileie compares to some of their closest competitors:

Smileie vs. NewSmile

These two are pretty similar companies—they both offer fully remote aligner treatment, nighttime-only options, accessible financing, and lower prices than some competitors. NewSmile has been around longer than Smileie, so they have a longer track record of success and more customer reviews, but they don’t have a “Pro” option like Smileie does, and their prices are slightly higher.

Smileie vs. Candid

Candid was once a fully remote clear aligner company, but now they offer only a hybrid model. Similar to Smileie Pro, it connects you to a local dentist, who you’ll visit for an exam and imaging, before completing treatment with virtual check-ins. Candid was one of the first to adopt this kind of hybrid model, so while they’re more expensive than Smileie Pro, they’re more well-established, they’ve served more patients, and they have more partner dentists—so it might be easier to find one near you.

Smileie vs. Invisalign

These two are on opposite ends of the price spectrum (Invisalign is typically thousands more), but you get much more intensive care with Invisalign. While Smileie has cut out office visits to reduce costs and time commitment, Invisalign requires them throughout treatment. Invisalign can also incorporate attachments and treat a range of complex misalignments. For people who are willing to pay more for in-person care, Invisalign is typically a solid choice, but Smileie is a lot more convenient and affordable.