Dental malpractice and standard-of-care disputes need an expert who can speak to what a reasonable practitioner would have done, and dentistry is one of the few clinical specialties most fee guides leave out entirely. It is missing from the main Expert Institute fee table and from the free summary of SEAK's survey, which is why the figures below are harder to find than they should be.
Here is what is actually published, with the source for each figure.
What do dental expert witnesses charge per hour in 2026?
Expert Institute publishes dentistry averages of $450 per hour for case review, $550 for deposition and $725 for court testimony. That is above the all-field placement averages of $356 / $448 / $478 and above the $465 all-field hourly average from the 2026 ExpertPages survey. No published survey we could find breaks out a dentistry-only median.
The figures come from Expert Institute's dentistry specialty page, read on October 9, 2026. Within that same data set, dentistry sits in the middle of the clinical range:
| Specialty | Review | Deposition | Court |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dermatology | $575 | $700 | $850 |
| Neurology | $575 | $750 | $925 |
| General Surgery | $550 | $725 | $975 |
| Oncology | $525 | $650 | $775 |
| Cardiology | $500 | $625 | $800 |
| Psychiatry | $500 | $575 | $625 |
| Dentistry | $450 | $550 | $725 |
| Emergency Medicine | $400 | $525 | $625 |
| Pharmacology | $400 | $475 | $450 |
| Nursing | $250 | $325 | $400 |
All rows read from Expert Institute specialty pages on October 9, 2026. Dentistry prices above emergency medicine and nursing, and below the surgical and neurological specialties.
Why is dentistry missing from most expert witness fee tables?
Because the table everybody quotes does not contain it. Expert Institute's main fee calculator breaks out 24 medical specialties and dentistry is not one of them. Its dentistry figures live only on the separate specialty page, which is a different data set with systematically higher numbers.
That distinction matters if you are comparing. The calculator table and the specialty pages disagree for every medicine we checked — neurology is $250 per hour for review in the calculator and $575 on the specialty page. So a dentistry figure from the specialty pages should not be read directly against a neurology or emergency medicine figure taken from the calculator table. The full comparison is in the medical expert witness fee guide.
SEAK's 2024 survey did cover dentistry — 24 dentists among more than 1,600 respondents — but its free summary publishes only all-field medians ($450 review, $475 deposition, $500 court) and response counts per specialty, not a dentistry median. The per-specialty breakdown is in its paid report.
What kinds of dental cases need an expert, and what drives the rate?
Expert Institute lists its dentistry experts against standard of care, informed consent, implant and restorative work, infection control and long-term outcomes. Rate drivers are the same as elsewhere in medicine: board certification, specialty within dentistry, a clean testimony record, and whether the engagement reaches deposition and trial rather than stopping at review.
Three things to establish before you retain:
- Specialty match. Oral surgery, periodontics, endodontics, orthodontics and general dentistry are different standards of care. An expert outside the defendant's actual field is an easy target on cross.
- Licensure and current practice. Confirm active licensure and that the expert still practises; a long gap is a Daubert exposure.
- Testimony history. Ask for every case in the past four years, which is required disclosure under FRCP 26(a)(2)(B) in federal court anyway. Our vetting checklist covers the rest.
What will a dental expert actually cost on a case?
More than the hourly rate implies. 74% of experts require a minimum fee to accept an engagement and 40% set it between $2,500 and $4,999 (ExpertPages 2026). Of experts requiring a retainer, the median is $3,000 (SEAK 2024). At the published dentistry rates, ten review hours plus a four-hour deposition is $4,500 plus $2,200, or $6,700 before retainer, minimum and travel.
You can total other combinations with the calculator on the 2026 fee guide, which includes dentistry as an option. On who writes the cheque and whether any of it comes back, see who pays expert witness fees.
Sources
- Expert Institute — Dentistry expert witnesses — the $450 / $550 / $725 averages, read October 9, 2026
- Expert Institute fee calculator — all-field averages of $356 / $448 / $478; contains no dentistry row
- SEAK 2024 Survey of Expert Witness Fees — all-field medians; 24 dentists among the respondents, no dentistry median published free
- 2026 ExpertPages® survey — $465 all-field average, minimum-fee figures
Related Reading
- Medical expert witnesses on WitnessDirect — the category hub dental experts are listed under
- Medical Expert Witness Fees 2026 — all 24 specialties in the Expert Institute table
- Expert Witness Fees 2026 — all fields, with the fee calculator
- Who Pays Expert Witness Fees?