Top 10 Aligners Questions – Answered!

By Celia Burns on 6th March 2026

If you’re feeling self-conscious about crooked or crowded teeth, you may have started looking into clear aligners or teeth straightening treatment. While aligners are a hugely popular and discreet way to improve your smile, it’s completely normal to have questions about how the treatment works, how long it takes, and what the process involves.

At Nothing But The Tooth, we speak to patients about aligners every day, and many people ask the same helpful questions before starting treatment.

In this guide, we answer the 10 most common questions about clear aligners, explaining how teeth straightening works and what you can expect from treatment with our team in Sutton Coldfield.

 

Question 1: How do aligners actually work?

Aligners are a series of custom-made, removable trays that are designed to move your teeth gradually. Each aligner is slightly different from the one before and applies gentle, controlled pressure to your teeth. As pressure is applied on one side of the tooth and relieved on the other, the bone and ligaments that support your teeth gradually remodel, allowing the tooth to move safely into its new position.

 

Question 2: Are all aligners Invisalign?

No. Invisalign is one of the first brands of aligners to come to the market, but many other companies now produce equally high quality and effective aligners, often at a lower cost. Invisalign has become a synonym for aligner treatment, like Hoover has for vacuum cleaner and Sellotape has for sticky tape!

 

Question 3: Will the aligners be noticeable to others? 

Straightening your teeth has never been more discreet. Gone are the days when many adults avoided braces because of bulky metal “train tracks”, because nowadays aligners are sleek, clear, and almost invisible braces. They will hardly draw any attention and most people won’t notice you’re wearing them.

 

Question 4: How long will the treatment take?

Treatment time really varies depending on your specific case and the issues you’d like to correct. In general, most treatments take between 4 and 9 months, but some more complex cases can take over a year. We will give you an estimate of when we think you will finish when you have your initial consultations.

 

Question 5: How often do I need to wear the aligners?

Aligners need to be worn for around 22 hours a day, and are only taken out for eating, drinking anything other than water, and cleaning your teeth. Wearing them consistently is really important, as it allows the teeth to move gradually and predictably into their new positions.

 

Question 6: How often will I need appointments and progress checks?

The number of appointments varies depending on your treatment needs, but everyone needs an initial consultation to determine your goals and suitability for treatment, a records appointment to gather the information to plan your aligners, and a fit appointment. After that, reviews vary in number and frequency. You can often check in remotely by sending us photos of your aligners and teeth to reduce the number of times you have to visit the practice.

 

Question 7: Will treatment be comfortable or painful?

The fitting, adjusting and removal of the braces is not painful, but you may find that your teeth ache for the first few days after adjustments, or after changing to a new aligner. Also the wires on fixed braces can make the cheeks sore for a week or two after they are first fitted. We provide you with special wax to put over the wires to make this more comfortable until the soreness wears off.

 

Question 8: Can I eat, drink and speak normally?

With any brace there is a period of adaptation for a week or two, and speech normally adapts very rapidly. As you cannot eat or drink anything other than water with aligners in, you’ll have to take them out to eat. You’ll probably find you end up snacking less frequently during treatment as a result!

 

Question 9: How much will it cost and are payment plans available?

Prices for teeth straightening treatment range from £2,260 to £5,240, depending on your individual needs and the method of straightening recommended for you.
Free whitening is included with all of our orthodontic packages, so you can also enjoy a brighter smile at the end of your treatment!
We also provide flexible finance options, helping to spread the cost and ensure that money isn’t a barrier to achieving the smile you want.

 

Question 10: Do I need to wear retainers afterwards?

Yes, absolutely. Many of our patients are having braces because they stopped wearing their retainers after they had orthodontics as a child and their teeth have relapsed. Teeth move throughout life and this movement can only be minimised by wearing either a fixed retainer on the back of the teeth or a removable retainer every night, for life – or as long as you want your teeth to stay straight!