The Oral-B Pro Smart 5000 CrossAction is a popular choice among those who want to take better care of their teeth and gums at home, but aren't necessarily in the market for the bells and whistles found on the top-end models in our guide to the best electric toothbrushes.
This fairly simple yet effective toothbrush removes 100% more plaque than a manual toothbrush, and uses a rounded head to better cup your individual teeth to remove trapped food.
Oral-B has also designed the Pro Smart 5000 CrossAction with a built-in pressure sensor. This is to protect your gums from abrasive brushing. Oral-B claims that the toothbrush will start whitening your teeth from the first use, which is something we'll put to the test here. For proper whitening at home, take a look at our guide to the best teeth whiteners.
Oral-B Pro 5000 review: Design and features
The Oral-B Pro Smart 5000 CrossAction electric toothbrush comes with one Floss Action brush head, a charging station with a storage compartment for refill heads, and a travel case. If you’d like to experiment with different types of brush heads for various levels and types of cleaning, this electric toothbrush is compatible with all of Oral-B's brush heads.
The battery takes around 10 hours to charge up fully, which isn't speedy by any stretch. And for that you get around 10 days of use when brushing your teeth twice a day for two minutes at a time. The newer Oral-B electric toothbrushes, such as the Oral-B Genius Pro 8000 CrossAction, has a faster charge time and lasts longer.
A flashing battery life display on the toothbrush lets you know the battery is low and needs recharging pronto.
The Oral-B Pro 5000 cleans with the same rotating, oscillating and pulsating movements behind the brand’s ADA Seal of Acceptance. Its cleaning modes are Daily Clean, Gum Care, Sensitive, Whitening and Deep Clean.
If you’d like also like a Tongue Cleaning mode, you can upgrade to the Genius Pro 8000 or try the tongue cleaners that come with the Pursonic S520. Whichever cleaning mode you choose, dental professionals recommend brushing for a full two-minute cycle twice daily.
If you are currently without a dentist, take a look at our guide to the best dental insurance to see how coverage will benefit you in terms of accessing preventive care from a dentist near you.
Oral-B Pro 5000 review: Performance
The Oral-B Pro Smart 5000 CrossAction is lightweight in the hand, and is very simple to use. It has five individual cleaning modes for you to explore, including whitening, gum care, and sensitivity.
If you care about receiving real-time feedback on the way you are brushing your teeth, or would like coaching on how to clean every quadrant of your mouth more evenly, connect the Bluetooth toothbrush with the Oral-B app (iOS, Android). You'll see an image on screen that represents your mouth.
Every time the 30-second interval buzzes on the toothbrush, a new quadrant of your mouth will flash up on the screen of whatever device you're running the app from. We found this useful, as between the 30-second interval timer and the real-time feedback, we concentrated more on properly cleaning our upper and bottom rows of teeth.
Selecting the cleaning mode you want is a matter of pressing the on button and cycling down the modes until you hit the one you want. Don't try to switch modes in the middle of cleaning your teeth unless you power off the toothbrush first - you'll end up covered in spit and toothpaste otherwise.
As for Oral-B's claims of whitening from the first use, we didn't notice this during the first day of use, though within a week our smile looked brighter. Not enough to make us want to give up our whitening strips, but it was a welcome addition to having cleaner, healthier teeth.
Although we like the Sonicare app a bit better, the Oral-B app has some great tools within its companion app for the Smart 5000 CrossAction electric toothbrush. The Focused Care feature enables you to customize your brushing plan based on advice from your dentist,.
The Dental Care Journey features gives you five pre-programmed dental hygiene routines to help you take better care of your teeth and gums. You can even check the news and the weather via the app, if you feel so inclined.
Like every toothbrush we have tested, the Oral-B 5000 has a built-in timer to ensure you brush for the dentist-recommended two minutes per session.
Should I buy the Oral-B Pro 5000?
Two-thirds of our brushing panel picked the Oral-B Smart 500 CrossAction as their favorite Oral-B toothbrush. It brushes more gently than the top-end Genius Pro 8000, but has a noisier motor.
Our testers also found it quite tricky to navigate between modes while brushing, so we recommend stopping the brush before switching - and only switch if you need to. The Smart 5000 CrossAction is a reasonably priced Bluetooth electric toothbrush to help you stay on top of your dental care. It's easy to use and effective at cleaning.