Usmile Y10 Pro sonic electric toothbrush review

The Y10 Pro has a lot going for it – especially at this price point. It packs in a digital display, four cleaning modes, a long battery life, USB charging and a brush head that vibrates between 31,000 and 38,000 times per minute. But some of its features work better than others.

Here’s what we thought.

Design and build

• Digital display
• Wider and longer than an average electric toothbrush
• Use straight from the box

In the box, you’ll get the Usmile Y10 Pro in white with a black two-part digital display, a user manual, two toothbrush heads in clear plastic containers, and a USB cable. Some boxes come with four toothbrush heads, so check what you’re getting before you buy.

The battery is charged before leaving the factory, so you can use the Usmile straight from the box. You simply open a toothbrush head, click it onto the toothbrush body, and away you go.

Interestingly, the Usmile is longer than other sonic toothbrushes: 25cm from the top of the brush to the base, rather than the more common 22-24cm, and we reckon that is probably down to the USB charging port in the bottom.

The main shaft is also rounder, with a diameter of 2.5cm. All this means that your hand is a bit further away from your face when you are brushing your teeth. Plus, the Y10 Pro is far from a slim toothbrush. Okay, it’s not going to overwhelm your hand, but some people might prefer something more lithe.

The brush head itself is 2cm long and roughly 9mm wide with the bristles cut into a trough shape in the middle of the head. The bristles will fade over three months to remind you to change your brush head.  

There are two buttons on the front of the toothbrush: an On/Off key below the digital display, and another white function button below that to cycle through the cleaning modes. The whole thing is IPX8 waterproof, so you’re safe to use it in the bath or shower.

Performance and features

• No charger – direct USB charging
• Four cleaning modes
• Timer and pressure sensor

One benefit of the Y10 Pro is that you charge it via USB directly into the bottom of the toothbrush: there’s no need for a charging base. You simply flick up the rubberised cap on the bottom of the toothbrush, plug in the supplied USB cable, plug the other end into a charger, and you’re done.

This means less bathroom clutter, but it’s something to bear in mind if you like a dedicated stand for your brush: the Y10 Pro does not come with one.

Alex Greenwood / Foundry

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Usmile says you can get up to six months of use from a fully charged battery (brushing twice daily for two minutes a time), and charging takes roughly four to five hours. When the battery is low, the charging icon will appear on the smart screen to prompt you to act. 

The Y10 Pro is a very simple toothbrush to use. You switch it on, choose your cleaning mode, and brush your teeth. However, there’s a lot going on in terms of feedback and responsiveness, although we didn’t find all of it useful.

There are four cleaning modes: smart, clean, white and soft.

The smart mode uses a gyroscope sensor and position recognition inside the brush to change the movement and vibration, which we experienced as a change in the oscillation of the brush head.

The clean mode is a standard moderate pressure clean. The white mode cleans with more intensity, and the soft mode with less.

There’s a pressure indicator, which we think is a pretty important feature in an electric toothbrush. If you apply too much pressure, the indicator on the back of the brush will light up in red. However, we found that you had to apply a lot of pressure for that to happen, so we’re not entirely convinced of its usefulness. 

The toothbrush will give you a vibration reminder every 30 seconds to prompt you to move onto the next quadrant of your mouth, and there’s also a timer.

When you’ve finished cleaning your teeth and switch the brush off, you’ll also get brushing feedback. It’ll tell you the time you spent brushing and two brushing coverage percentages. There’s also a feedback message, which we sometimes found perplexing.

We weren’t sure what the two brushing percentages meant, and the feedback messages can be a bit opaque. One simply says “need enhance” so we suspect something was lost in translation there.

Still, we found that the Y10 Pro gave teeth a consistently good and deep clean.

Price and availability

In the US, the Usmile Y10 Pro is available direct from Usmile itself, or from Amazon for $109.90.

Replacement brush heads are also available from Usmile for $24.99 for a pack of four.

At the time of writing, the Y10 Pro is not yet available in the UK. However, you can get the Usmile Y1S Roman Column brush from Amazon UK for under £50. It comes in a variety of fetching colours with a travel case and two brush heads. You can find out more about this brush in our round-up of the best budget electric toothbrushes.

Verdict

The Y10 Pro has the best battery life of the brushes we’ve tested, plus USB charging, and a timer. However, we don’t think the pressure sensor is sensitive enough and we found brushing feedback to be confusing rather than useful.

Still, the Y10 Pro does what it’s supposed to do – it gives your teeth a good clean and it does it for a decent price.

For more electric toothbrush options, have a look at our round-up of the best electric toothbrushes we’ve tested.