Electronic: Philips/Sonicare Essence Sonic Toothbrush

This is the older fatter Essence style that I use myself. It is cheaper than the newer models without the fancy not-that-useful features. The only thing seriously wrong with it is after about 3 years, the rechargeable battery gradually loses the ability to hold a charge and you have no option but to discard the whole unit or buy an new handle from the USA. I don’t know if any of the newer models are any better. This model comes with only one brush head. Philips has also disabled the quadrant timer to remind you to get on with the next quarter of your mouth. I suspect they did that hoping to irritate people into buying the crazy expensive models. Phht!

I have discovered you can get even better results with it by holding it vertically for part of the brushing. It then brushes each tooth side-to-side rather than up and down over the entire tooth length. You can think of it as like sweeping a floor in two directions.

The replaceable heads cost about $20 each and last 6 months. This sounds exorbitant until you consider how much you save in dentist bills. Each time you brush your teeth with a sonic toothbrush, in terms of number of brushstrokes, it is like brushing your teeth manually thirty times. 31,000 brush strokes per minute.

Specs.

Philips/Sonicare created the original sonic toothbrush, but now there are other brands too. I am not familiar with them. Amazon sells this model under four different part numbers and four different prices. You have to look around even within Amazon to get the best deal.