NHS dental statistics 2025/26: more people seen, but new patients still struggle

The NHSBSA release, "Dental statistics - England 2025/26", reports activity under the NHS dental contract. The main national figures:

• —18.8 million adult patients seen in the 24 months to 31 March 2026, 40% of the adult population.
• —7.17 million child patients seen in the 12 months to 31 March 2026, 60% of children.
• —37.6 million courses of treatment, 6% more than in 2024/25. Of these, 61% were Band 1 and 11% were urgent treatment.
• —25,419 dentists with NHS activity, 3% more than the year before. That is 43 dentists per 100,000 people, ranging from 69 in Hertfordshire and West Essex ICB to 34 in Norfolk and Waveney ICB.

The area figures are where the gap shows. Measured by where the contract is held, NHS South Yorkshire ICB saw 55.9% of its adult population. NHS Somerset ICB saw 22.7%, fewer than one adult in four.

The figures were read in two ways.

Healthwatch England, in a blog on 1 October 2026, pointed out that the share of adults seen is about the same as the year before and still below the roughly 50% seen before the pandemic. It also highlighted the gap between more and less deprived areas: urgent care makes up a much larger share of treatment in the most deprived communities.

The Nuffield Trust published its own analysis, "The great extraction", on 24 August 2026, a few days before the NHSBSA release. Its authors, Harvey Seville and Mark Dayan, found that the share of dental practices offering NHS general dental services has fallen from 64.6% to 55.6%. Using the 2025 GP Patient Survey, they found that 87% of people trying to book at a practice they had used before succeeded, against 38% of people trying as new patients.

NHS England's own analysis of that survey, published on 24 July 2025, put the gap at almost 50 percentage points and said it was largely unchanged from 2024. It also found that 32% of would-be new patients were told the practice was not taking new patients, down from 35% in 2024. The 2026 GP Patient Survey was published on 9 July 2026, but when we checked on 2 November 2026 NHS England had not yet published its dental breakdown for new and returning patients.

The Office for National Statistics asked adults about urgent dental problems in its Health Insight Survey (fieldwork 21 July to 12 August 2026, published 10 September 2026). Among adults with an urgent dental need who tried to get an urgent NHS appointment, 95.6% of those with an NHS dentist got one. Among those without a dentist, 29.9% did.

What people did after failing matters too. Of the adults without a dentist who could not get an urgent NHS appointment, 69.0% took no further action. Seeking treatment from a private dentist was the most common step for those who did act.

If you are a practice, the people most likely to message you out of the blue are the ones these figures describe: adults without a regular dentist, often contacting several practices at once, often after being told "we're not taking new NHS patients" somewhere else.

Three things help them, and help you:

1. 01Answer the NHS question in the first sentence. Yes, no, or "children only". A patient who has already asked five practices is not reading past a vague reply.
2. 02If the answer is no, say what you can offer. If you have private appointments, say when and what a private check-up costs. Some patients will book. The rest leave with a straight answer.
3. 03Point them on if you can't help. The NHS "Find a dentist" service lists practices that say they are accepting new NHS patients, and NHS 111 arranges urgent dental care for people without a dentist.

Speed matters for the same reason. When the same question has gone to several practices, the first clear answer is the one the patient can act on.

ReplyOS answers new enquiries on web chat, SMS, email and, on Pro and Scale, WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook, using the facts the practice has set up: services and prices, FAQs (such as whether you are taking NHS patients), opening hours and the booking link. Urgent or clinical messages are handed to the team rather than answered automatically.

The answer still has to come from the practice. If your NHS position or your private check-up price isn't written down anywhere, no system can give it. Writing it down is the first step whatever you use.

Our guide to dental lead response time, at replyos.co.uk/dental-lead-response-time, covers how quickly new enquiries should get that first answer.