If you want a cleaner, healthier, and whiter smile (who doesn’t?), an electric toothbrush needs to be in your arsenal of daily dental tools. Why? Well, it:
- Removes up to 21% more plaque
- Is more gentle on the gums
- Does most of the work without much effort from you
Now, before you frantically Google ‘electric toothbrush Malaysia’ and get swamped by a tsunami of features that sound impressive but mean nothing to you…
Stop. Take a deep breath. Bid adieu to your sad manual toothbrush.
And read this handy guide on what you should look out for in your hunt for the one brush that’ll give you all the right vibrations.
Yes, still talking about toothbrushes here.
Check the number of oscillations
Every electric toothbrush vibrates, but not all do it at the same speeds. Just so you know, electronic toothbrushes can be classified according to the speeds of their movements, which, therefore, affects how they clean your teeth.
And the two most popular types found in Malaysia are:
- Sonic Toothbrushes (24,000-40,000 oscillations per minute) rely on large sweeping brush stroke motions to clean the teeth; it is the bristles on the brush head that sweep away food particles and bacteria present on the teeth and gum line.
- Ultrasonic Toothbrushes (~1,200,000 oscillations per minute) – do not rely on physical sweeping motions; the vibrations are powerful enough to break up bacterial chains that form plaque. So, teeth-cleaning happens even if you rest the bristles on your teeth.
First off, it goes without saying that manual toothbrushes come nowhere near electric / sonic toothbrushes as far as oscillations and brush movements are concerned.
So using an electric toothbrush will give your teeth a more thorough cleaning than any manual brush.
Now let’s get into the cool stuff.
Let’s be honest – “ultra” sounds much cooler than anything without an “ultra” right?
After all what would Ultraman be without an “Ultra” appended to his name???
He’d be just a man.
Nonetheless, you might want to note that ultrasonic toothbrushes are going to cost you more than sonic ones.
It all boils down to your budget and preferred cleaning intensity.
Multiple modes of cleaning
Peek at an electric toothbrush’s packaging, and you’re likely to see multiple cleaning modes available.
Some electric toothbrushes do just the one thing, others two, while some perform as many as 6 types of cleaning.
“Do my teeth even need so many cleaning modes?”
You might ask.
As you’ve probably realised, cleaning modes are eerily similar to Pokémon. It’s so tempting to catch them all – when all you need is one reliable Pikachu.
Here’s a brief guide on what the most common modes do:
- Daily mouth cleaning – This is pretty much self-explanatory; it’s the standard mode for your twice-a-day teeth cleaning.
- Gum care – Often a gentle massage of gums to stimulate blood flow for the strengthening and nurturing of the gum tissue. A spa day for your gums, if you like.
- Sensitive – A gentle, yet thorough cleaning, for sensitive areas of the mouth.
- Whitening – Helps polish teeth to give that dentist-clean look and feel for, well, whiter teeth.
- Tongue cleaner – Cleans the tongue or inside of the cheeks.
Keep a lookout for specific modes that suit your personal needs.
Let’s say you want a brighter smile.
The only additional mode–in addition to the ‘daily mouth cleaning’–should be the ‘whitening’ one. The others are nice-to-haves but not absolutely necessary.
That said, you’ll need quite a bit of time before you start seeing whiter teeth from the whitening modes.
Pressure sensors & built-in timers
Dentists recommend brushing your teeth for 2 minutes continuously for the best cleaning results. But let’s be real–nobody stares down the clock, counting down the seconds when groggy in the morning or exhausted at night.
The solution?
Get an electric toothbrush equipped with an in-built timer–it automatically alerts you whenever you’ve hit your required brushing duration!
Other than an in-built timer, you might also want to consider a toothbrush that features a pressure sensor. Why? Well, because aggressive brushing can lead to:
- Sensitive teeth
- Receding gums
- Teeth decay
An electric toothbrush that has a pressure sensor will either freeze or alert you when you’re going at your teeth too hard.
Smart functions
Are you a data geek who salivates at the thought of analysing how well each one of your pearly whites is getting cleaned?
If so, you might want to consider getting an electric toothbrush that comes with a Bluetooth connectivity option. This enables you to sync information about each of the teeth you’ve cleaned, and the pressure you’ve applied on them, to your phone.
Ultimately, this understanding can help you improve your brushing skills over time.
Is this feature nice to have? Sure.
Will your oral health improve dramatically with more dental data to obsess over?
Debatable.
Takeaway:
Skip the smart functions if all you want is an electric toothbrush that gets the job done for you (and not one that adds on to your workload).
Time to electrify your brushing routine
It’s true.
Electric toothbrushes work better than an old manual toothbrush when it comes to keeping your smile in clean, tip-top shape.
Just be sure to get one with features that actually matter to you.
Because the last thing you need is bloatware in your mouth every morning and night.
Switch to Zenyum Sonic
The electric toothbrush that delivers over 30,000 sonic-powered vibrations for a deeper clean.
