How to Compare Dental Software in the Philippines: What "Free", "AI" and "SMS Included" Really Mean
It's 11 PM and you've typed "best dental software philippines" into Google. Four tabs in, you notice that nearly every page you've opened was written by a company that sells dental software.
One of them may have been ours. We publish a comparison of nine dental software products, with every price dated and linked, and OtterFlow is one of the nine. So read this with that in mind.
A vendor's list isn't automatically dishonest, but it isn't neutral either. And the words on the pricing pages it sends you to, like "free", "AI", "online booking" and "SMS included", can each mean two or three different things depending on whose page you're on.
You can check most of it yourself in an evening, and you should. That goes for our page too.
The short answer
- Pick the job first. Are you buying something to run the clinic (records, charts, billing) or something to get patients to the chair (answering messages, booking, reminders)? Most products are built for one of those.
- Check how the list was made. Are the prices dated? Does each one link to the vendor's own page? Does the writer admit what their own product can't do?
- Turn six phrases into pesos. Free, AI, online booking, SMS included, coming soon, and the monthly price itself. Each one leaves a question the pricing page doesn't answer.
- Test the two that survive, once as a patient and once as your receptionist.
Our guide to dental clinic management software in the Philippines covers step 1. Most of this article is steps 2 and 3, because that's where the fine print is.
Who writes the "best dental software" pages
You'll mostly see three kinds of page for this search.
Vendor pages come first. A software company writes about its own category, and usually about itself. Klinikly's home page title, for instance, calls it the "Best Dental Management System in the Philippines". Our comparison page is a vendor page too. That doesn't make either page wrong. It means the writer has a stake in what you pick.
Then there are directories, which list dozens of products with star ratings. They look neutral, so read how they earn money. SoftwareSuggest's list of clinic management software in the Philippines says it "highlights products from our valued client partnerships", and that the site is free for users "because vendors pay us when they receive web traffic and sales opportunities". The same page says its ratings contain no paid placements. Both can be true at once. It's also a clinic list rather than a dental one, so confirm a product has dental charting before it goes on your shortlist.
The third kind is a guide like this one, with a product mentioned somewhere near the end.
So don't throw out a page because a vendor wrote it. Throw it out if you can't check what it says.
Four checks for any list
| Check | What a good list does | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Are the prices dated? | Says when it checked, next to the prices | Prices here move. On the day we checked for this article, one vendor's home page was announcing new pricing. |
| Does each price link to the vendor? | Links the vendor's own pricing page | You can confirm the number in half a minute. |
| Does the writer name their own weak spots? | Says plainly what their product doesn't do | If a vendor can't name one weakness, you're reading a brochure. |
| Are the two jobs kept apart? | Compares records tools with records tools, and chat tools with chat tools | A records system and a booking service aren't rivals on price. They do different work. |
Run our page through the same four. It dates the prices it lists, links each competitor's price to the vendor's own page, and has a section called "OtterFlow's downsides, plainly". If it skipped any of those, you'd be right to discount the whole thing.
Six phrases to turn into pesos
We checked every example below on the vendor's own website on 30 September 2026. Each one shows what a phrase can mean in practice. None of this is a ranking, and every example is a reasonable choice for some clinic. Pages change, so click through before you rely on any of it.
1. "Free"
On a software page, "free" usually means one of three things:
- a free plan that stays free while you stay inside its limits
- a free trial that ends (HeyDenta, for example, offers 14 days with no card needed)
- free software with a fee charged somewhere else
SeriousMD's Basic plan costs nothing a month. The same pricing table lists a service fee of "5% + Php75" on payments made through SeriousMD. On a ₱1,500 cleaning, 5% plus ₱75 comes to ₱150. Whether that's a good deal depends on who pays the fee and how many of your patients pay that way, so ask about both.
Ask: "What would we pay in a month where we see 300 patients, fees included?"
2. "AI"
At least three different things go by this name on dental software pages.
- AI that writes notes. It turns the dentist's dictation into clinical notes. HeyDenta's plans count "AI scribe visit notes" per month, and Klinikly lists a "Speech-to-Note Scribe". That's useful in the operatory, but it won't answer a patient's message.
- AI that answers patients and passes them on. It replies, collects details, and leaves the booking to your staff.
- AI that answers and books. It offers open times and puts the patient on the schedule. Read the details even here. HeyDenta says its chatbot books appointments, with "new patients confirmed by your team".
None of these is wrong. They solve different problems. The first saves the dentist time. The other two decide what happens to the Facebook message that comes in at 10:47 PM. Our piece on what a dental Messenger chatbot should do goes through that side in detail.
Ask: "A new patient messages at 10 PM. Show me what's on the schedule when my staff come in the next morning."
3. "Online booking"
Two quite different things share this label.
With a request, the patient picks a time and your staff approve it later. MyDMD says so plainly. Its requests "land in a staff inbox for review" and are "never auto-confirmed". Some clinics want exactly that, because nothing reaches the schedule without a person seeing it first.
With a confirmed slot, the patient takes a time that's genuinely open and gets a confirmation straight away.
The difference shows up after hours. With a request, the patient doesn't know they're booked until someone at the clinic gets to it. Ask how the patient finds out, and whether it's through a channel your patients actually check.
Ask: "Let me book on your demo page as a patient. How long until I know I'm booked, and where do I find out?"
4. "SMS included"
This phrase leaves out three numbers: how many texts you get a month, what counts as one text, and what you pay after you run out.
The allowances vary a lot. SeriousMD's Pro plan, at ₱1,950 a month, lists "System notifications + 100 credits". HeyDenta's plans include 150, 300 or 600 SMS reminders a month, depending on the tier.
Now count what your clinic would use. Say Smile & Skin Clinic has two dentists seeing about 14 patients a day, six days a week. That's roughly 360 appointments a month. One text when the patient books and one reminder the day before makes two per appointment, so more than 700 texts a month before a single recall or follow-up goes out.
Then check what counts as one. A single SMS holds 160 characters. A longer reminder goes out in parts, and each part is usually billed as a separate text. Our SMS reminder templates show how to keep a reminder inside one.
Ask: "How many texts do we get, how do you count one, and what does each text cost after we run out?"
5. "Coming soon" and "rolling out"
You start paying the day you sign, so count only what works that day.
Some vendors are upfront about it. HeyDenta's home page says its AI works on web chat and its booking page today, "with SMS, Messenger, Instagram and WhatsApp rolling out". That's an honest way to put it. The risk is on your side. When Messenger is the reason you're shopping, a line saying it's on the way is easy to read as a line saying it works.
If one channel is the reason you're buying, ask to see a real conversation on that channel in the demo. If it isn't live yet, get the date in writing.
Ask: "Which of these channels can a patient use today?"
6. "Per month"
The monthly figure can grow in three ways that the headline number doesn't show.
- Per branch. Molarsoft is ₱1,499 a month, plus ₱499 a month for each additional branch. That's clearly stated and cheaper than a second subscription. Just put it in your sums before you open a second branch.
- Per dentist. Some plans are sized by how many dentists use them. HeyDenta's tiers, for example, go from one dentist to two or three, then to multi-branch.
- Billed yearly. MyDMD's Starter plan shows ₱500 a month, and the page explains that's the monthly rate on the annual plan, billed as ₱6,000 once a year. That's a fair price. You just pay it all at once.
Ask: "What will we pay the month we add a second dentist, and is that paid monthly or up front?"
A comparison sheet you can fill in tonight
Open a notebook or a spreadsheet, give each product a column, and use these rows. Only fill a cell once you've seen the answer on the vendor's own page or heard it in the demo. If a vendor can't give you an answer for a cell, write that down too.
| Row | What to write |
|---|---|
| Job | Runs the clinic, or gets patients to the chair? |
| Real monthly cost | At your patient volume, with fees, branches and dentists added |
| Billing | Monthly, or a year up front? |
| SMS | Texts a month, how one is counted, the price after that |
| "AI" | Writes notes, answers patients, or answers and books? |
| Online booking | A request, or a confirmed slot? |
| Live today | The channels that work now, not the ones coming soon |
| Exit | Can you download every patient as a spreadsheet? |
Then test the two that are left
The pages get you to a shortlist. Two tests decide it.
The patient test. At 10 PM, message each vendor's demo the way your patients write: "Hi po, magkano cleaning? Pwede bukas?" See whether you end up with a booking, a form to fill in, or silence until morning. Our guide to after-hours patient inquiries covers what a good answer looks like at that hour.
You can run it on us right now. The chat on our home page is a real Flo working for Smile & Skin Clinic, our demo clinic. Ask it a price and try to book a cleaning. It takes a real slot and texts the number you give it, so use your own.
The receptionist test. Let the person at your front desk drive the demo instead of the salesperson. If they can't find tomorrow's 2:30 patient in under a minute, that's what the next year at your front desk will look like.
Our six demo tests for Cebu clinics go further, including what happens in a brownout and how to get your records back out.
Common mistakes
- Comparing a records system with a booking tool on price. They do different jobs, and you may need one of each.
- Reading "free" as "costs nothing". Check the fees and how long the trial lasts.
- Counting one text per appointment. A confirmation and a reminder make two, and a long reminder can count as more.
- Paying for the roadmap. Buy what works today.
- Trusting a list with no dates. If you can't tell when the prices were checked, check them yourself.
- Choosing from the salesperson's demo. The person who'll use it every day should drive it.
Where OtterFlow fits
OtterFlow only does the second job. A patient messages your Facebook page or web chat, and Flo answers from information you approved, in English, Taglish or Bisaya. It offers times that are genuinely open, books one, sends an SMS confirmation, reminds the patient before the visit and follows up afterwards. When a question needs a person, it hands the conversation to your staff.
It isn't a records system. There are no dental charts, no billing and no HMO claims, so you'd still need records software next to it. The products above are a good place to start looking. Our comparison page lists these downsides next to the other eight products and their prices.
Setup: ₱0. Then 4,975 a month. That's more each month than a records subscription like SeriousMD Pro or Molarsoft, because it covers the AI, the SMS allowance and a small Cebu team that sets it up and keeps it running.
Questions owners ask
Can I run a records system and a booking tool together?
Yes. Decide which one holds the schedule before you start. If both keep their own calendar, someone at the front desk ends up copying bookings from one to the other, and that's where double bookings come from. Ask each vendor how their calendar connects to anything else. OtterFlow, for example, syncs bookings to Google Calendar and has an API for developers.
How much does dental software cost in the Philippines?
Among the records systems we checked for this article, published prices ran from ₱500 a month billed yearly (MyDMD's Starter plan) to ₱1,950 a month (SeriousMD Pro), and SeriousMD also has a free plan with a fee on payments. Our price guide covers the wider range.
Before you pick one
"Best" is the one word on these pages you can't check. Everything else you can: the date on a price, the fee behind "free", the number behind "SMS included", and whether "online booking" means a request or a booking. Fill in the sheet tonight, cross off anything that won't give you a straight answer, and message the two that are left at 10 PM. If OtterFlow is one of them, book a 15-minute call and we'll run that test with your own clinic's services and hours.