The best AI receptionists for dental offices in 2026

What is the best AI receptionist for a dental office?

The best AI receptionist for a dental office is the one that fits how your practice books appointments and handles patient information, so the answer changes from one office to the next. Two questions sort most practices quickly.

• Does a booked appointment have to land in your practice management system without anyone touching it? If yes, start with the dental-only products below that name your system, such as Dentrix, Eaglesoft or Open Dental.
• Is it enough for the receptionist to take the request and have your front desk confirm the time? If yes, a general receptionist like Leap can work, and the choice comes down to price, the BAA and how messages reach your team.

Every vendor here, us included, makes claims we can't check from the outside. Treat the table as a shortlist for your own calls and demos.

Dental AI receptionists side by side

Sources: Leap pricing, Arini Dentrix guide, Arini Open Dental guide, Weave AI Receptionist, Viva AI, Dentina, Smith.ai AI receptionist pricing, Smith.ai for dentists.

How we chose these six

We looked for AI phone receptionists that sell to dental offices and publish enough on their own site to compare. We left out vendors whose own pages disagreed with each other on price or HIPAA, because we couldn't tell readers which version to believe. We also left out phone systems where the AI receptionist is one feature of a larger plan. Ask those vendors directly if you already use their phones.

The products, one by one

Leap

Leap reads your website and Google listing, drafts answers you review, and answers calls you forward to it. You keep your number. When a patient wants an appointment, it takes the name, reason, preferred time and callback number and sends your team a summary by text or email, and your team confirms the slot. If your site has a booking link, it can text that link to the caller. It can also answer in English plus up to two more languages you turn on, and transfer to your office while you're open if you turn that on.

What it doesn't do: it doesn't connect to Dentrix, Open Dental, Eaglesoft or any other practice management system, it can't reschedule or cancel existing appointments, and there's no free trial. Setup is free, billing starts when Leap answers real calls, and there's no contract. More on Leap for dentists and orthodontists.

Arini

Arini builds only for dental practices. Its Dentrix integration guide describes real-time scheduling in Dentrix, Eaglesoft, Open Dental and Denticon, and says a signed BAA comes before integration. Pricing isn't on its site, so expect a sales call.

Weave AI Receptionist

Weave's AI Receptionist answers calls and texts and, for qualified dental practice systems, books and reschedules appointments. It's part of Weave's patient communication platform, so it's most natural for offices already on Weave. The page lists no price.

Viva AI

Viva is dental-only and prices by monthly credits that meter the AI's work. Its homepage says it reads and writes your schedule through direct practice system integrations, answers texts, chat and email, and signs a BAA for every practice.

Dentina

Dentina is dental-only and names the widest list of practice systems we found, including Open Dental, Dentrix, Eaglesoft, Curve, Denticon and Cloud9. Its listed prices are per location, up to three providers, on annual billing.

Smith.ai AI Receptionist

Smith.ai sells an AI receptionist to many kinds of small business and has a page for dentists. It has a free plan for low call volume, and its dentist page describes handing some calls to human agents. We didn't find a HIPAA or BAA statement on the pages we read, so ask before patient details go through it. We compare it with Leap in more detail on Leap vs Smith.ai.

How much does a dental AI receptionist cost?

Published prices on the sites we checked run from a free 25-call plan to $1,199 a month, and two of the six don't publish a price. The way each one bills matters as much as the number.

• Per call: Leap is $149 a month with the first 100 calls included, then $0.99 a call. Smith.ai's plans include a set number of calls a month.
• Credits: Viva's plans include a monthly credit allowance for AI work.
• Per location: Dentina prices each location, up to three providers, billed annually.
• Quote only: Arini and Weave don't list prices on the pages we read.

Pull your monthly call count from your phone bill before you compare, and ask each vendor what happens when you go over. If you're also weighing a live answering service, we priced three of them in our dental answering service comparison.

Which AI receptionists sign a BAA?

Leap, Arini and Viva say on their sites that they sign a business associate agreement; Weave and Dentina describe HIPAA protections without mentioning a BAA on the pages we read, and Smith.ai's pages we read don't mention either. That doesn't mean the others won't sign one. It means you should ask.

The ADA's HIPAA business associate FAQ tells dentists to identify every business associate and make sure an appropriate business associate agreement is in place with each one. A service that answers your phones and takes patient messages handles patient information, so a HIPAA badge on a website doesn't replace a signed agreement.

For Leap: we sign a Business Associate Addendum with your practice, and your calls run on a separate protected setup where patient information only goes to vendors covered for HIPAA. Ask us to turn it on. On that setup, the text your team gets carries no patient details; it's a link to sign in and read the call.

Which ones book into dental practice software?

Arini, Viva and Dentina say they book straight into dental practice management systems, Weave says it does for qualified dental systems, and Smith.ai's dentist page says it books in your practice software without naming one. Leap doesn't integrate with any practice management system.

If you need appointments written into your PMS while the patient is on the phone, put the vendors that name your system at the top of your list, and ask to see a booking land in your version during the demo. Leap takes the request and your front desk confirms it. If you connect a Google Calendar, Leap can write the event there, which helps offices that run their schedule from Google but not offices that schedule in their PMS.

How to choose

Choose by asking every vendor the same questions in writing and comparing the answers against your own call volume and practice software.

1. Will you sign a BAA before we go live? Get it in writing, per the ADA guidance above.
2. Which practice management systems do you book into, and which version of ours? A Dentaltown post by a dental AI vendor argues that real deployments need PMS integration and HIPAA hosting. If you don't need that, you may be paying for it.
3. What will patients hear, and can we call it ourselves first? Call each demo line yourself, ask a hard question, and listen for whether it makes you repeat your details.
4. What does a month cost at our call volume, and what counts as a billed call? Spam, hang-ups and wrong numbers vary by vendor.
5. How does a message reach the front desk the next morning? Text, email, a dashboard or a note in your PMS each suit a different team.
6. Is there a contract or setup fee? Leap has neither; some vendors bill annually.

When a different product fits better than Leap

• You want booked appointments written into your PMS. Look at Arini, Dentina, Viva or Weave, and confirm they support your system.
• You already run your phones and texting on Weave. Its AI receptionist sits inside the platform your team already uses.
• You want two-way texting with patients run by the AI. Several dental tools above say they hold text conversations; Leap texts your team and sends callers short texts such as a booking link.
• Your phone barely rings. A plan with a small call allowance, or a small live answering plan, may cost less than $149 a month.

Leap fits when your front desk is happy to confirm appointment requests and you want a published monthly price and a BAA. You can start with your website, review what it built, then forward your office phone when you're ready.