Technology

Oclean X Ultra S Review: The Talking Electric Toothbrush

Published

5 days ago

August 10, 2024

Oclean X Ultra S in black, on a black granite surface

At a glance

Expert review

Positives

Good battery life
Custom brushing modes
USB charging
Color screen
Clear pressure sensor

Disadvantages

Giving feedback is too complicated
Pricey

Our verdict

This brush is high quality, elegantly designed and does everything – and more – you would expect from an electric toothbrush. If not all the features are a hit, there are enough to make this an excellent, albeit pricey, purchase.

Price upon review

$129.99

Best prices today: Oclean X Ultra S

If you like a lot of technology in your electric toothbrush, Oclean is a brand to consider. The electric toothbrushes are packed with advanced features.

The X Ultra S is no exception. It may be the first electric toothbrush that talks to you.

Design and construction

Color touchscreen
Lightweight handle
High quality brush heads

The X Ultra S is an attractive brush, with a tapered, matte handle and a full color touchscreen display. It comes in two color options: back and light green.

There’s a button below the screen to turn it on and off, but you switch between cleaning modes by swiping across the screen. When you brush, the screen shows a countdown timer, but the numbers are small and it’s not easy to read while brushing, which isn’t helped by the silvery film over the display.

Emma Rowley / Foundry

When you start brushing, a horrible image of orange-red teeth appears on the screen. As you brush, the teeth on the screen turn white. The goal is to show areas you miss while cleaning. You also receive much more detailed brushing feedback via the app.

At the bottom of the brush handle there is a light ring pressure sensor that lights up red if you press too hard. Over-brushing is a common problem, and this is one of the features we consider indispensable.

The brush is noticeably light in the hand and weighs only 110 grams, compared to the 137 grams of the Oral-B iO4. That’s even more impressive when you look at the features and the long battery life: there’s a lot on board.

Emma Rowley / Foundry

It comes with a lighted USB charging dock, a magnetic wall holder for the brush and three brush heads: ultra gum care, ultra clean and ultra white.

I’m always a bit perplexed when oral care brands do this, because most people will prefer one type and it would make sense to include three brush heads of the most popular, universal type.

Emma Rowley / Foundry

But the brush heads are well made, with a tapered silicone brush head that’s gentler on gums and a mix of silicone and nylon bristles.

Emma Rowley / Foundry

There’s also a USB charging case for travel, with room for the brush handle and two brush heads. It’s black and gray (or green and cream, depending on the brush color you go for), with a vegan leather finish. The quality is significantly higher than the hard plastic cases you get with even a high-end Oral-B iO. Also, iO cases don’t have a charging port – and the brushes don’t offer USB charging at all.

Emma Rowley / Foundry

Oclean claims the X Ultra S has a 40-day battery life, but this is likely only if you stick to two 2-minute brushing sessions per day.

If you share the brush or brush for longer, it will be less. I’ve used some custom programs that can be three or even four minutes long. If you do the same, I think two to three weeks is a more realistic battery life.

Performance, features and app

Range of brushing modes
Adaptable brushing
Voice alerts while brushing

The X Ultra S is quiet in use and delivers good cleaning performance. But that’s really just the beginning of what it can do.

Most electric toothbrushes offer you an easy choice of cleaning modes. For example, you can have gentle daily care and gum care. The X Ultra S is a little different.

Using the touchscreen you can choose between sensitive gum care, whitening polishing, scientific brushing (more on this later), unlimited cleansing, soothing sunrise and sunset clearout – which are a lot of options, and it’s not immediately clear what they all offer to have.

But there is more. To get the most out of the brush, you’ll need to download the Oclean app, create an account, and pair your brush. In our test this was quick and easy to do.

If you want the most advanced electric toothbrush available, the X Ultra S is the solution

In the app you can adjust the brushing performance to your preferences in various ways. To get started, you can take a quiz about your dental health and get a smart suggestion. Or you can choose from one of 14 cleaning modes (e.g. underwire, super whitening or travel). You can even create your own custom brushing mode, specifying brushing time, brushing mode and intensity level.

This may seem like a lot of hassle just to brush your teeth, but I really liked the ability to customize brushing and the mode I created felt effective and left my teeth clean.

The X Ultra S also provides feedback on brushing, both in real time and afterwards. While you brush, it provides AI voice guidance: it talks to you via bone conduction to correct your technique.

To enable this feature, choose the scientific brushing method and prepare. Because the first time a little voice out of your mouth says, “Overprint” or “Go on to the next part,” it’s a bit of a surprise.

Once you return to your body after shock, you may be wondering how effective this is. It’s true that it’s hard to ignore a voice coming from your own head, but it’s not always clear what the voice is saying. If you have music on while you brush, it can be impossible to decipher what your toothbrush is asking you to do. And let’s be honest, it’s very disturbing.

I can’t help but hope it’s a feature that isn’t catching on.

These voice alerts not only warn you if you are brushing too hard, but also let you know to continue brushing another part of your mouth and correct your brushing technique.

In the app you also see the percentage of battery life remaining (useful) and how long you have been using your current brush head.

There is also a huge amount of feedback about brushing. Undoubtedly too much. Every cleaning session is recorded and analyzed. The main form of feedback is the ‘Brush Clover’, a graphical illustration of your brushing success, measuring session duration and frequency and giving you an overall brushing score out of 100.

This is useful, in a playful way, in the sense that it is quite addictive to try to improve your brushing score and can be a useful tool for anyone who wants to review their brushing technique, or who forgets to brush regularly.

In the app you also see a map of your teeth. After brushing, the areas that you have neglected become visible. But the question is how accurate the brush position detector is. Frequently the app showed that I was neglecting the left side of my mouth, but never the right side, even though I was only swiping around that side and spending much longer on the left side. But my dentist never mentioned this as a problem. Do I have a problem with the way I brush, or with the brush position detector?

But all in all, there is a lot of good information here. But like most dental care apps, I suspect most people will abandon it in the longer term.

Emma Rowley / Foundry

Price and availability

In Britain this is undoubtedly an expensive electric toothbrush. It has an RRP of £199.99 and you can buy it for this price from Oclean’s website. It’s even more expensive at Selfridges: £219.99.

This brush is undoubtedly one of the most versatile we tested, and if you want the AI voice prompts, you won’t get them anywhere else. However, if you’re happy with a luxury brush with color screen, choice of brushing modes, pressure sensor and app compatibility, you can buy the Oral-B iO8 for £150-£170. You can read our iO8 review to find out if it better suits you, but keep in mind that it doesn’t have USB charging and the battery life is much shorter.

In the US, the X Ultra S is available from Oclean for $129.99, making it a more tempting purchase.

If this isn’t the purchase for you, check out our reviews of the best electric toothbrushes and the best cheap electric toothbrushes for more options and buying advice. We also have a specific Oral-B review, to help you choose the best Oral-B brush for you.

Should you buy the Oclean X Ultra S?

Oclean’s X Ultra S has a host of impressive features. I particularly liked the USB charging and USB travel case, the well-designed brush heads, the screen on the handle, and the ability to customize brushing. I’m not sold on the AI voice alerts and I have some reservations about the pinpoint accuracy of the position detection system.

However, it’s undoubtedly the most versatile electric toothbrush we tested, and it’s light in the hand, quiet and effective. In short, if you want the most advanced electric toothbrush, the X Ultra S is the solution.