What is a normal overhead percentage for a dental practice?

Owners often ask what overhead should be. The honest answer is that no official standard exists, and figures online depend on definitions. This post reports what three sources opened on October 26, 2026 say, labels each by publisher and year, and lists what to check before comparing. It is general information, not accounting advice. Ask your CPA how to define overhead for your practice.

What is dental practice overhead?

Overhead is the cost of running the practice. The overhead percentage divides those costs by collections. Overjet, a dental software company, defines it in a 2025 blog post as every expense except doctor compensation, including staff salaries, supplies, rent, equipment and administrative costs.

That definition is a choice. Another source could count owner pay as an expense. The same practice would then show a higher percentage. This is the first reason that figures from different sources do not line up.

What overhead percentage do sources report?

The Overjet post (September 2025) says overhead typically ranges from 60-65% of total collections and attributes this to the American Dental Association (ADA). This post could not find that figure on the ADA pages it opened, so treat it as a vendor claim. Overjet also reports a median near 62% and says high-performing practices often keep overhead between 55% and 60%. It offers no study or sample size for those statements.

Overjet reports these ranges by size, all as shares of collections.

Overjet also gives category ranges as shares of collections: staff and payroll 25-30%, supplies and lab fees 6-8%, facility and equipment 6-10%, marketing 2-4%, and technology 1-3%. These are vendor figures. Overjet sells dental AI software, so weigh them accordingly. The payroll and lab fee lines are common ones to track.

Is overhead rising?

A 2025 Dental Economics article by Levin Group reports on its 19th annual practice survey, taken in January 2025 among general dentists in private practice. Ninety-one percent of respondents were owners or partners. The article reports:

The article calls the roughly 5% yearly rise a possible new normal. The author leads Levin Group, a practice management consulting firm, and his recommendations lean toward higher production. This post uses only the survey counts.

How do you calculate your own overhead?

Use a repeatable method. These steps follow the Overjet example, and you should confirm them with a CPA.

1. Collect 12 months of profit and loss data.
2. List operating expenses the same way each month.
3. Decide in writing whether owner pay is in or out.
4. Divide total expenses by total collections.
5. Track the result over time.

The example in the Overjet post divides $600,000 in expenses by $1,000,000 in collections to get 60%. Those numbers are an illustration, not a benchmark.

What does the ADA say about overhead?

The ADA’s finance guidance, drawn from material by practice consultant Ken Runkle, suggests viewing overhead in terms of revenue. It says growth, not only cost cutting, affects the percentage. The page offers no benchmark number. The wider guide on dental practice KPIs and benchmarks explains why a single number rarely fits every practice.

What does a percentage mean in dollars?

Overjet gives a simple illustration. A practice collecting $1,000,000 a year keeps a different amount before doctor pay at each overhead level.

The figures show arithmetic, not a forecast. Real practices differ in size, payer mix and local costs.

Why do sources disagree, and what is a point worth?

Overjet says the gap between 55% and 70% overhead on $1 million in collections is $150,000 in profit. That is simple arithmetic: 15 points of $1,000,000. Dental Economics gives a similar example. An $800,000 practice that cuts overhead by 4% adds $32,000 in annual profit and income, which is 4 points of $800,000.

Both examples rest on the same idea: each point of overhead is a point of collections. They do not show that any practice can cut overhead by that amount. Costs, contracts and local markets differ, and some cuts reduce care or staff capacity. Weigh any projected savings against the practice’s own books.

What should you check before comparing?

Use this checklist when you see an overhead number.

Collections and production are different bases, as the post on production vs collections explains. The guide to dental practice management covers the systems behind these numbers.

Next step

For the full set of numbers practices track, read the guide on dental practice KPIs and benchmarks. Contact Dr. Copeland about consulting questions. Dr. Jon Copeland, DDS, is a general dentist in Wildwood, Missouri.