What's a Trial Smile?

A Rehearsal for Your Teeth

Pictures of other people's veneers tell you very little about your own face. Even a good digital design on a monitor is a flat image. Put the same shape in your mouth and things look different: your lips sit over it, your cheeks lift, and you hear how you sound with it in.

That's what a trial smile is for. It takes the plan off the screen and puts it where it will actually live, so you can judge it with your own eyes before anything permanent happens. For porcelain veneers, where shaping the enamel can't be undone, Dr Sharma won't prepare a tooth until you've worn the design and agreed to it.

How It's Made

1. Records. Still photos, a few seconds of video while you chat and laugh, and an iTero Lumina scan of both jaws. No putty trays.
2. Design. The new tooth shapes are drawn digitally over your own face, so length and width follow your lips and features rather than a template.
3. Mould. The design is turned into a clear mould that fits over your teeth.
4. Mock-up. The mould is filled with tooth-coloured temporary material and pressed gently into place. It sets in a few minutes and the mould comes away, leaving the new shapes sitting on your teeth.
5. Removal. When you've finished looking, it peels off. Your own teeth are exactly as they were.

The whole design appointment takes around ninety minutes, and most of that is spent looking and talking rather than having anything done. You're welcome to bring a partner or friend along for the last part.

What to Look at While It's In

• Length at rest. Relax your lips. How much tooth shows? Too little can look aged; too much can look false.
• The smile line. Smile broadly. Do the edges of the top teeth follow the curve of your lower lip?
• Shape and character. Squarer reads as bolder, rounder as softer. Do the two sides mirror each other closely enough for you?
• Speech. Count from 60 to 70 and say a few words with F and S in them. Longer front teeth can catch the lower lip.
• Photos. Take them from the front, from each side and from a few feet away, ideally by a window.
• Gut feeling. Does it look like a better version of you, or like someone else?

Changing the Design

This is the cheapest moment to change your mind, so use it. Ask for the edges shortened, the corners softened, a tooth brought forward or the whole smile narrowed. Every change is an edit to a file, not to your teeth. If the changes are large, a second mock-up can be made so you can check again.

Once you sign off, that design becomes the reference for everything after. For porcelain, it guides how much each tooth is shaped, which is how reduction is kept small, and the technician builds the porcelain to match it. For composite, Dr Sharma uses it as the template while he sculpts each tooth by hand. The finished teeth follow the shapes you signed off, though porcelain and polished composite will look livelier than the temporary resin did.

When a Trial Smile Is Used

Always: porcelain veneers, before any enamel is touched, and smile makeovers that combine aligners, whitening, bonding, veneers or implants, so you can see the end point the plan is working towards.

Usually: larger composite bonding and composite veneer cases.

Not normally needed: whitening, because only the colour changes; a single chipped edge, which is shaped straight onto the tooth at the bonding visit; and Invisalign, where a 3D simulation of how your teeth should move does a similar job. Dr Sharma will tell you at the consultation if your case needs one. The smile makeover page shows where it fits in a full plan.

What You Pay

Nothing extra. On our fee list the smile design is from £250 and the trial smile from £250, and both sit inside the cost of your treatment once you go ahead. The consultation is free, booked with a £40 deposit that's returned within seven days of attending.

You leave with a written plan setting out which teeth change, the order of treatment and a fixed fee, and you can take as long as you like to decide. For reference, porcelain veneers are from £695 a tooth and composite bonding £395 a tooth. The Hamilton veneers cost guide has fuller totals.

Where the Preview Stops

A trial smile is very good at shape, length and proportion. It's weaker on colour and finish. The temporary resin is flatter and more opaque than porcelain, which has a glassy depth to it, and the final shade is chosen separately in daylight, against your natural teeth after any whitening.

Because the mock-up sits on top of unprepared teeth, it can feel and look a fraction fuller than the finished veneers. It also can't predict how teeth will look after Invisalign, or how the gum line will sit after contouring. Those steps happen first, and the design is confirmed again afterwards. Think of it as a dress rehearsal, not the opening night.

One more limit is worth knowing. The mock-up is held on by friction alone, so it can't show how the teeth will feel to bite and chew on over weeks. The bite is checked properly with the temporaries and again at the fitting, when small adjustments are made so the new edges meet comfortably.

Questions

This guide is general information, not a diagnosis. A dentist needs to examine you to say what is right for your teeth.