Orthodontist Salary in 2026: What Orthodontists Earn
How much does an orthodontist earn? The median orthodontist salary in the U.S. is $289,140 a year, or about $139 an hour, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (OEWS, SOC 29-1023, orthodontists, May 2025). The middle half of orthodontists earn $146,580 to $342,300, and the top 10% earn more than $416,000. What an individual orthodontist makes depends mostly on whether they own a practice, how many cases they treat and where they work.
25th percentile
$146,580
Median (50th)
$289,140
75th percentile
$342,300
90th percentile
$416,000
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (SOC 29-1023, Orthodontists), May 2025 (via O*NET/BLS) — the most recent national release.
Orthodontist Compensation Structure
Compensation for orthodontistsvaries significantly by employment type. Here's how the most common structures break down:
National median
About $139 an hour (BLS OEWS, SOC 29-1023, May 2025).
$289,140 / yr
Typical range (10th–90th pct)
Orthodontist wages span an unusually wide band (BLS).
$99,850–$416,000
Owner vs. associate
Most orthodontists own or partner in practices, so earnings blend clinical pay and practice profit (directional).
Owners typically higher
How Much Do Orthodontists Earn? Salaries by Percentile
BLS does not publish orthodontist salaries by years of experience, so there is no official figure for a starting, mid-career or senior orthodontist. What it publishes is the spread of annual wages across employed orthodontists, all from the same May 2025 release (SOC 29-1023).
Read the lower bands as a rough stand-in for where early-career pay can sit and the upper bands for established earners. They are percentiles, not experience tiers.
Early-career pay. There is no official figure for a new orthodontist. The 10th and 25th percentiles ($99,850 and $146,580) show where the low end of the wage distribution sits. They are the closest stand-in BLS offers for early-career pay, not what a new residency graduate is paid.
Residency comes first. Every orthodontist finishes dental school and then an accredited orthodontics residency of at least 24 months, so no one earns an orthodontist's wage straight out of dental school. Neither BLS nor CODA publishes resident pay, so this page doesn't estimate it. The orthodontics residency guide covers the training itself.
Moving up the bands. Production, ownership and an established patient base, all of which tend to build over a career, are what move an orthodontist from the lower percentiles toward the top. Years in practice alone don't set the figure.
Highest-Paying States for Orthodontists
Ranked among states whose BLS estimate rests on a usable sample; 18 states with small or imprecise samples are left out of the ranking and shown in the full table below.
Practice Owners vs. Associate Orthodontists
Ownership is the biggest single driver of what an orthodontist earns. Most orthodontists own or partner in a private practice, and an owner's income starts with the practice's production (the value of the treatment delivered) and collections (what patients and insurers actually pay).
Staff wages, rent, supplies, lab fees, equipment and any practice loan come out of collections. What remains is profit, earned on top of the owner's clinical work. BLS wage data captures that profit only partly, as the FAQ below explains, so treat the figures on this page as a floor for owners.
Associate orthodontists, employed by a practice or a dental support organization (DSO) without an ownership stake, are usually paid a salary, a daily rate or a percentage of production or collections. Ownership adds the costs and risks of running a business on top of the extra income.
Our dentist guides walk through the same decision from the general-dentist side: owning vs. associating, partnership buy-ins, and DSO vs. private practice.
Braces, Clear Aligners and Case Volume
Orthodontic income tracks case volume closely. Much of the work is elective, and patients arrive both on referral from general dentists and by booking directly, so a practice's referral relationships, marketing and local competition shape how many new cases start.
Braces and clear aligners are both core orthodontic treatments, and most comprehensive cases run a year or more. An orthodontist's schedule and income therefore build on a steady flow of new starts.
Clear aligners also widen the competition. Many general dentists offer aligners for simpler cases, and direct-to-consumer aligner options compete for the same patients. How that nets out varies by practice, and no official source measures its effect on orthodontist pay.
For what the job involves day to day, see what an orthodontist does.
Orthodontist Pay by State and Cost of Living
State figures for orthodontists are thinner than for most dental jobs. The workforce is small: BLS estimates 6,210 orthodontists employed nationally (OEWS, SOC 29-1023, May 2025), a count of wage-and-salary jobs that leaves out self-employed practice owners.
As a result, BLS publishes an orthodontist wage estimate for only 19 states, with no figure for California, Florida, Texas or 29 others. Most of the published state estimates rest on a small or imprecise sample. Only Wisconsin's ($212,860) currently passes the reliability check this site applies, so the "Highest-Paying States" list above shows that one state: it is the one usable estimate, not a pay ranking. Every figure in the table below is a rough signal rather than a market rate.
Cost of living also changes what a salary is worth. A higher median in an expensive state can buy less than a lower one where housing and everyday prices are cheaper. Each state page, such as orthodontist salary in Wisconsin, sets the BLS figure against that state's price level from the Bureau of Economic Analysis.
Orthodontist Salary vs. General Dentists and Oral Surgeons
Orthodontists earn well above general dentists at the median, $289,140 against $170,950, and below oral and maxillofacial surgeons at $352,220 (BLS OEWS, May 2025). Training follows the same order: CODA's accreditation standards set a minimum of 24 months for an orthodontics residency and four years for oral and maxillofacial surgery.
The ranges overlap more than the medians suggest. The orthodontist 25th percentile ($146,580) sits below the general-dentist 75th percentile ($224,040), so a busy general practice can pay more than a slow orthodontic one.
Orthodontics and dentofacial orthopedics is one of 12 dental specialties recognized by the National Commission on Recognition of Dental Specialties and Certifying Boards, an agency of the American Dental Association (ADA). Which dental specialty pays the most ranks every specialty group BLS tracks, and orthodontist vs. general dentist compares the two jobs beyond pay.
What Affects Orthodontist Salary?
Ownership. Owners and partners add practice profit to clinical pay, while associates are paid a salary, a daily rate or a share of production.
Case volume and treatment mix. New case starts, the balance of braces and clear aligners, and local competition all move income.
Location. Published state medians vary widely, but most rest on thin samples. Compare an offer with your state's price level, not just the headline figure.
Experience and production. An established patient base and higher production move an orthodontist up the percentile bands over a career.
The route into the specialty is covered in how to become an orthodontist. For current openings, browse orthodontist jobs. Practices setting pay for an opening can find the employer side in what to pay an orthodontist.
Salary figures are BLS estimates for general information only; actual pay varies by ownership, case volume, region and experience. Pay models are described in general terms. This is general information, not legal or medical advice; have an attorney review any employment or partnership contract before you sign.
Orthodontist Salary by State
Orthodontists are a small occupation, so BLS publishes a state wage estimate for only 19 states — there is no published figure for California, Florida, Texas or 29 others. Absence here means BLS did not publish an estimate, NOT that orthodontists are unlicensed, absent or poorly paid in that state. For a fuller national picture see the percentiles above.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much does an orthodontist earn an hour?
About $139 an hour at the median, the hourly equivalent of the $289,140 annual median BLS reports for orthodontists (OEWS, SOC 29-1023, May 2025).
Few orthodontists are actually paid by the hour, though.
Associates are usually paid a salary, a daily rate or a percentage of production, and owners take practice profit on top of clinical pay, so effective hourly earnings depend on the schedule and the pay model rather than a set wage.
What is the starting salary for an orthodontist?
BLS publishes no separate wage for new orthodontists.
The closest official reference is the lower end of the orthodontist distribution: the 10th percentile is $99,850 a year and the 25th is $146,580 (BLS OEWS, SOC 29-1023, May 2025).
Those are stand-ins, not new-graduate salaries.
Orthodontists earn as specialists only after dental school and a residency of at least 24 months, and first-year pay depends mainly on the contract and how quickly case volume builds.
Which state pays orthodontists the most?
BLS data can't answer this reliably.
BLS publishes orthodontist wage estimates for only 19 states, and only Wisconsin's ($212,860, below the $289,140 national median) passes this site's reliability check, which is why it appears alone in the list above; that list is not a pay ranking.
The highest published medians, Connecticut at $478,680 and Colorado at $416,000 (BLS OEWS state estimates, May 2025), carry BLS error margins of ±14.7% and ±23.7%, so treat them as rough signals.
California, Florida, Texas and 29 other states have no published figure: missing data, not low pay.
How many orthodontists are there in the U.S.?
BLS estimates 6,210 orthodontists employed in the U.S. (OEWS, SOC 29-1023, May 2025).
That is a count of wage-and-salary jobs, so it leaves out self-employed orthodontists who own their practices, and the number practicing is larger than the BLS figure.
It's a small occupation next to general dentistry, which is also why BLS publishes orthodontist wage estimates for so few states.
Do BLS orthodontist salary figures include practice owners' profit?
Not fully.
The OEWS survey collects the wages employers pay their employees, including production bonuses, and does not cover self-employed workers.
It also leaves out overtime, nonproduction bonuses and the employer's cost of benefits such as health insurance (BLS OEWS technical notes).
An owner's practice profit is business income rather than a wage, so read these figures as a benchmark for associate and employed orthodontists and a floor for owners.