Dental websites, made easy: A practical guide to making your own

When patients need a new dentist, most turn to the internet first. We’ve all been there—whether we’re overdue for a cleaning or had a recent insurance change. When looking for a new dental practice, one of the first things people check is the website. If your practice doesn’t have a strong online presence, you’re likely missing out on a significant number of potential patients.

We know running or managing a dental practice keeps you busy, but now is the perfect time to get started with a free website builder. While making a website from scratch might seem overwhelming, we’ve got the tools to make the process simple—and leave you smiling. Regardless of if you’re new to web design or want to give your dentist website a makeover, keep reading for expert tips and step-by-step guidance.

Your potential patients aren’t just looking for any dentist—they’re searching for a dentist who’s professional, trustworthy and meets their practical needs, like convenient locations, office hours and accepted insurances.

Having a website makes your services more discoverable to those in need of a new provider. It serves as a virtual representation of your practice, offering visitors a nice introduction that reassures them they’re in good hands. A well-designed dental website can answer potential clients’ questions upfront and build trust by highlighting the qualities and expertise that set your dental practice apart.

Another one of the benefits of a website is that it can make life easier for you and your patients. Features like online scheduling, digital patient forms and payment options add a layer of convenience that leaves a lasting impression. For many patients, your website becomes a touchpoint for quality customer service that extends beyond the office walls.

Before we jump into the process of how to create a professional website, let’s think about which elements will serve you and your web visitors. Effective web design results in great functionality, ease-of-use and the right aesthetic—and there are more specific criteria dental websites need to achieve this balance. 

In comparison to trendy e-Commerce stores or artistic portfolio websites, a dentist website is a type of website that doesn’t need to hone in on design trends to make an impact on visitors. Since your dental website will be used by a diverse audience from all sorts of backgrounds and demographics, it’s more important to use a design that’s intuitive and inclusive. 

A healthcare website like yours should focus on a clean aesthetic that presents your practice’s information without overwhelming visitors. That doesn’t mean beauty isn’t a factor—a simple yet modern website can be incredibly attractive, making a positive impression that’s balanced with user-friendliness.  

A well-crafted dental website goes beyond looking good—it provides a smooth and frustration-free user experience. By prioritizing user-friendliness, your website becomes more than a marketing tool. Whether it’s a potential client or a current one, every visitor to your dentist site should find useful content and practical tools to help them achieve their goals. 

And these days, there are so many supportive website features available, there’s no excuse not to spoil visitors. As you build your website, take advantage of AI and business tools that can make your site extra user-friendly. For example, an AI chat box that responds to your visitors’ questions immediately. Or, to simplify bookings and payments, integrate online forms, scheduling software and online payment options that work on any device. These tools don’t just help patients—they reflect your practice’s commitment to accessibility and convenience.

Web accessibility is an important step to make sure people with disabilities can engage with your site’s content and features. Rather than treating this as an afterthought, it’s important to build your site with accessibility in mind. 1 in 4 people in the US suffer from a disability—whether it’s visual, audial, cognitive or other—making it likely that some of the customers your dental practice serves will require accessible elements.  

Nir Horesh, Head of Accessibility at Wix

It’s good to know that tools like Wix are designed with accessibility in mind, and tools like the Accessibility Wizard exist to guide you with an AI-powered accessibility scan. Still, these tools don’t cover it all. Learning how to make a website accessible and ensuring your site is accessible will benefit your customers and make sure those with disabilities aren’t alienated.

Every website has a navigation system in place—but the best website navigation feels instinctive, guiding visitors effortlessly. For a dental website, good navigation is the key to helping patients find what they need conveniently, whether that’s office hours, your appointment booking page, or learning more about your team. This means building a navigation menu and using internal links to group your site’s pages together, which we’ll show you how to do in the step-by-step guide below. 

Now that you’ve got the gist of how a dental website will affect your practice, let’s review the steps of how to create one. Here, we’ll mention important parts of the process and show you how to launch a new website like a pro using a website builder to support your project. 

Before getting into the hands-on creation process, your first step should be to draft a strategic plan for your dental website. This is a process that combines research with creative brainstorming. 

Similar to mapping out a business plan for a private company, planning your website will be important to create a vision, maintain direction and stay focused throughout the project.  

Here’s how to flesh out your intentions at this stage: 

• Do competitor research: Take a peek at other dental websites that inspire you and take note of their design and content decisions. While you don’t want to completely copy their site, this is a helpful way to learn more about dental website design and gain useful ideas.

• Define your audience: Knowing who will use your website provides an anchor for many decisions, from how to approach your website’s copy, to branding and design elements, too. 

Many first-time dental practice owners may not have the time or the money to hire a professional website designer. That’s where a tool like Wix comes in. Today, there are plenty of website building software available that can put website development in your hands, providing an affordable and easy way to design a website on your own.  

When you review the options to pick the right website builder for your project, consider the following:  

• Solid website infrastructure: A website builder that prioritizes high performing website infrastructure is one you can rely on to keep your site up and running properly at all times. This refers to the hardware, software, network and server components that work together to deliver your online content. 

• Dependable web hosting: Curious about what is web hosting? Web hosting is exactly what it sounds like—that is, the technology where all of your site’s files are stored to be accessed by visitors. Most website builders include hosting, but you should find one that’s known for its quality, since this will affect your site’s speed, reliability and security. 

• Diverse pricing plans: Website builders present a great opportunity for cutting down how much a website costs these days. It’s easy to find a platform with pricing plans that accommodate your current budget, but it’s just as important to seek one that offers you potential to grow. 

For example, Wix provides a free version upfront, with the option to upgrade to Wix Premium Plans at any time—this ensures that you’ll have access to more advanced design, business and marketing tools when your website needs it. 

• Marketing and business elements: Even if you don’t use them right away, a dental website will benefit from a platform that supports small businesses. Look for a software that prioritizes marketing and business tools—whether it’s tools for brand building, eCommerce solutions for selling products or booking integrations to help customers. 

As your site’s web address, a domain name is an important element to decide on. This name not only serves the functional purpose of getting visitors to your homepage, it’s part of the brand identity your patients link to your online presence. 

Your only goal when picking a domain name should be to keep it simple and on-brand. Include 1-3 related terms, such as the name of your practice, your location, or dentistry-specific keywords like “dentist,” “clinic,” or “oral surgery.” A domain name also includes a TLD (top level domain)—which is the last, but certainly not least important part (that’s the .com in Wix.com). Some popular TLDs compatible with dental websites include: .com, .dental, .dentist, .clinic, .org or .net. 

If you have a domain name in mind and want to see if it’s available, a handy tool like a domain name search engine can tell you what’s yours for the taking, while offering alternative ideas. 

Perhaps not as useful as dental floss, but website templates can help any dental practice get their online presence shining and ready in no time. Most website builders include template collections, which feature pre-made designs and layouts with varying levels of customization. 

When thinking about how to choose a website template for your dental practice, focus on three things: your business goals, the layout, and the features you need to get started. The right template will have the essentials for a great dentist website while allowing you to tweak it to reflect your practice’s branding. Simple website templates are great for a clean and professional look, while industry-specific health and wellness templates can be a smart choice to explore, too.

These templates may already include useful tools like appointment scheduling or design elements that resonate with dental patients. Remember, the right template combined with your personal touch will create a website that effectively represents your practice online. Once you find the perfect template, you can quickly start customizing elements like fonts and color scheme. 

It’s time to start drilling web content into your site. Like every patient’s smile, each dentist website is different—but here are some foundational parts of a website and user-friendly elements we recommend you include: 

• Homepage: Since this is the first web page visitors will interact with on your site, it’s important to use this space to introduce your practice. A homepage should include your dental practice’s name, strong imagery, and important details such as office locations, hours and contact info.  

• Your own logo: A distinctive logo and branding is important for your practice’s success. A logo design can include traits that immediately communicate to your clients who you are and what your practice stands for, and like most branding elements, acts as a tool for differentiating your dental business from others. Your logo should be placed on your website, usually found in the website header—this strategic location will ensure no visitors miss it. 

Pro tip: Want guidance on how to create a logo of your own? Check out our guide on how to create a medical logo for inspiration and tips on how to nail your branding in the healthcare industry. 

• About Us page: Use your About Us page to build trust with new visitors and potential patients. Here, it’s typical to give more details about your dentistry, elaborating on the practice’s mission and specialties. Your dental website’s About page is also the perfect page for a “Meet the Team” section, and can feature photos of your employees, alongside their professional bios. 

• Contact page: A contact page is a standard way to give visitors informative details like your business’s office locations, phone number and emails for getting in touch. To add more user-friendliness for visitors, we recommend including a Google map for seamless navigation to your office, as well as using a contact form builder to streamline their communication process. 

• Scheduling apps: Bookings tools display available appointment slots to customers so they can schedule their appointment directly on your website. This speeds up processes for busy patients, and it’ll also provide you with convenience on the website management side of things. Your team can keep an eye on scheduling, send reminders and get notified of new bookings or cancellations—providing a more efficient way of running the office.  

• High quality images: You should include high-quality imagery and videos throughout your site that capture the essence of your dental practice. We’re talking about patients showing off their bright smiles, and friendly images that reflect high quality customer service. 

Whether you set up a custom photoshoot or take images from your website builder’s collection of stock images, be sure they’re dental related and inspire your audience with high quality. Also, a “Before and After” gallery is priceless—if you get permission from clients to showcase their dental journey, that’s a great way to show off your practice’s dentistry (and customer service) skills. 

Your website’s navigation acts as a digital roadmap, helping visitors discover different pages and sections of your dental practice’s website. Your site’s menu should guide visitors to find exactly what they’re looking for, whether that’s booking an appointment or learning more about your services. 

In general, website navigation can vary in complexity. For example, a multi page website vs single page website will change the size of a menu, and a bigger site may require more sophisticated navigation tools like pagination. But for a dental website like yours, it’s really important to keep it simple, clear and intuitive—especially because patients are often searching with specific details in mind.

Make sure your menu is well organized, with the most important pages front and center. Key sections might include Services, About Us, and Bookings. Submenus can add clarity too, for example, under About Us, you could list a category like Meet the Team. When you consider your patient’s journey, you should also add internal links or call-to-action buttons throughout your site, making it easy to book appointments or access information from any page. 

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the practice of optimizing your content to improve your website’s ranking on search engines like Google. While SEO is a marketing strategy of its own, including basic elements will set you off with a strong foundation. This can be implemented by using relevant keywords in your site’s written content, and especially within your site’s headings, alt texts and metatags. 

To start, focus on local SEO, including keywords that encourage Google to display your site when people search local dentistry-related queries, like “dentists near me.” You should also focus on industry terms such as “dentist” and “dental practice,” along with those related to your location and specialties. For example, aiming for specific keywords like “teeth cleaning in Miami,” “family dentist in Miami” or “porcelain veneers” can eventually draw relevant traffic to your site. 

Pro tip: Register your website for Google My Business, a Google directory that will amplify local SEO to bring more traffic to your website. 

Put yourself in your clients’ shoes—most of them will want to access your website from a mobile device. If it’s too difficult to use on smaller screens, they’re likely to lose interest before they even think about making an appointment. It’s important to make sure your site is as mobile-friendly as it gets, so visitors on their smartphones have a great user experience.

Most website builders include responsive design features that automatically adapt your site for mobile, which is one of the most important tools you can have today. While this technology does the heavy lifting of mobile design, it’s important to have control over these elements if you can. For example, with Wix, the Mobile Editor allows small changes to your content and layout, so you can make sure your dental website meets your standards across all screen sizes.

Before you hit “publish,” you want to feel confident in how your dentist website looks and functions. That’s why it’s important to take time to review your design and make sure it’s in tip-top shape. Use our website launch checklist to make sure no important tasks are ignored, and send a preview of your site to honest family, friends and colleagues, too. 

Having a second and third pair of eyes review your website can help highlight any glitches in functionality, design and content. From pointing out spelling errors, to gaining feedback on the user experience—hearing what other users think is a valuable way to gain constructive feedback, especially since they might observe things you don’t. 

Once your website is published, it should do more than just showcase your practice—it should actively work to grow it. Your dental website can become a marketing powerhouse, attracting new patients searching for a dentist, and turning curious visitors into loyal clients. 

Online healthcare marketing is the key to making this happen. By combining creative strategies and psychology tricks to improve your website, you can generate leads with new traffic and guide your visitors to take action. From encouraging content to effortless booking tools, here are some ways to get marketing leverage on your website: 

• Add testimonials and stats to build trust: Including reviews of satisfied patients is a great way to show new visitors they can trust your practice. You can also include statistics, like how many patients you’ve served, to reflect your experience. Both kinds of content can encourage potential to book an appointment with you.

• Start a dentistry blog: There’s so much expertise you can share to build a relationship with dental clients—that’s where learning how to start a blog comes in. Whether you write tips for dental procedures, or provide in-depth guides related to your practice (like, “what is a wisdom tooth and why do they get removed?”)—these expert topics are valuable resources in their own right, and may convince a new visitor to use your services.  

A blog maker is an excellent way to improve your site’s SEO, too. With SEO implementation, your website may become available in search results when people ask Google or Gen AI tools about these topics. 

• Include CTAs: Strategic calls-to-action (CTAs) help visitors engage with important

  content—whether it’s your About Us page, bookings page or more. CTAs are effective because they come in the form of customized buttons, which you can design using unique shapes, colors and font styles to attract attention. Use concise copy, such as “learn more” or “book now,” and place CTAs in visible locations that encourage visitors to click through.  

• Include a QAB: For mobile users, a quick action bar (QAB) offers instant contact. Include actions like email and phone calls, or create custom links for direct access to key information. This ensures your visitors can easily get in touch or find what they need.

• Online forms: Your site can assist incoming or current patients by providing the tools to get them ready for their upcoming appointment. Consider including documents like intake forms or patient agreements that your customers can fill out online in advance. This will make their in-person intake easier, and enhance their customer experience by providing a sort of portal online. 

That being said, a dental website, like a medical website, is subject to Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), which sets national standards in the US for protecting sensitive and personal health information. For dental websites, HIPAA compliance can be necessary, especially if you collect, store, or transmit personal information through features like forms, patient portals or online payment processing. 

There’s a lot to take away from this guide on how to make a dentist website, but here are some outstanding best practices you should always keep in mind as you go: 

Dos of dental website design: 

• Do prioritize user friendliness. 

• Do feature scheduling software.

• Do optimize your site’s content for speed and performance. 

• Do make contact info easy to find. 

• Do showcase trust factors.

Don’ts of dental website design: 

• Don’t overload your site with too much text. 

• Don’t ignore SEO and accessibility. 

• Don’t use generic content. 

• Don’t overcomplicate the design. 

• Don’t skip mobile optimization.

These can give you ideas for creative ways to use Wix and provide inspiration for how to engage an audience in the health industry. 

Let’s take a look at some of the best dental websites built on Wix to inspire your dental website journey:

North Park Dental’s website combines a clean design with vibrant images, creating a welcoming feel. Notable features are an integrated appointment scheduler and a service breakdown that highlights their focus on family care. This easy-to-use layout guarantees patients find what they need quickly.

New York Prosthodontics’ website exudes sophistication and professionalism, ideal for a high-end dental practice. With a sleek layout and clear navigation, visitors can easily access essential information and meet the team. The homepage emphasizes expertise with patient testimonials and detailed treatment options.

Calimesa Dental showcases the power of simplicity. Their minimalistic design focuses on clean visuals and straightforward navigation, making it easy for visitors to find essential information like services, contact details and office hours. This site prioritized functionality for their users, offering a smooth experience while maintaining a professional and welcoming feel. This approach is known to build trust and show the dental practice’s dedication to patient care.

Family Precision Dental’s site focuses on creating a connection with potential patients through vibrant imagery and approachable content. Features like patient resources and detailed service descriptions help visitors make informed decisions about their dental care.

We Care Dental keeps it personal with a warm and welcoming design that emphasizes patient-centric care. It includes a strong CTA for scheduling appointments and highlights their commitment to affordable dental care. 

With the right tools and guidelines, you can master the process of how to make a website for your dental practice. We hope this guide provides you with ideas and knowledge to assist you in this process. If you’re interested in learning more about our tools, check out our guides on what is Wix and how to make a Wix website. Since it’s within the same industry, this blog post on how to create a medical website may provide you with more inspiration, too.