By Joanna M. | Director of Telehealth Clinical Operations | Fact-Checked for Clinical Accuracy
If you grind your teeth at night, you already know the damage it causes — worn enamel, jaw pain, cracked fillings, and restless sleep. A custom night guard is one of the most cost-effective ways to protect your teeth without the $600-plus price tag from a dental office. Two names come up frequently in Canadian searches: Sporting Smiles and NewSmile. This review breaks down how they compare for Canadian buyers in 2026.
Sporting Smiles is a US-based direct-to-consumer dental lab headquartered in the United States. They make custom-fitted oral appliances — including night guards, sports guards, and retainers — using a mail-in impression kit process. Their products are manufactured in a US lab and shipped from the US.
Yes, Sporting Smiles does ship to Canada. However, that cross-border shipping comes with real costs that their website does not always make obvious up front.
Sporting Smiles lists their night guards in US dollars. Depending on the product and thickness, their custom night guards are priced in the range of approximately $149 to $189 USD at time of writing. When a Canadian customer checks out, they are charged in USD — meaning the actual CAD cost depends on whatever the exchange rate is on the day of purchase, plus any applicable import duties and taxes at the border.
Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) can apply duties and GST/HST to personal imports from the US, particularly for dental appliances that cross above certain de minimis thresholds. The effective cost for a Canadian buyer can be meaningfully higher than the listed USD price once exchange and border fees are factored in. Sporting Smiles does not absorb these costs — the buyer does.
Sporting Smiles operates entirely from the US. If you have questions about your appliance, need a remake, or have a fit issue, you are dealing with a US-based support team across a border. There is no Canadian phone number, no Canadian mailing address, and no familiarity with provincial dental norms or Canadian consumer protection expectations.
The process for ordering from Sporting Smiles follows a standard at-home impression kit flow:
The turnaround from impression receipt to delivery is typically listed as two to three weeks from when the lab receives your impressions — not from when you place your order. Add the time for the kit to reach you in Canada, for you to complete the impressions, and for them to ship back across the border, and the total timeline from order to receiving your guard can stretch to four weeks or longer depending on your province and postal timing.
Sporting Smiles offers multiple thickness and hardness options — soft, hard, and dual-laminate. This is a genuine strength of their catalogue. However, more options also means more decisions, and without a Canadian clinician or support team who can advise on your specific grinding pattern, choosing the right material is left entirely to the buyer.
NewSmile is a Canadian company built specifically for the Canadian market. The NewSmile custom night guard Canada is priced at $129 CAD — that is the real price, in Canadian dollars, with no currency conversion and no import duties because the product ships within Canada.
Like Sporting Smiles, NewSmile uses a mail-in impression kit. You receive your kit, take impressions at home, and mail them back to the lab. The process is straightforward, and the kit includes clear instructions. Once the lab receives and approves your impressions, your night guard is fabricated and shipped as soon as production is complete — there is no artificial holding period.
NewSmile's production and customer support are Canadian-facing. If your impressions are unclear, if your guard needs a refit, or if you have questions about your order, you are dealing with a team that understands the Canadian customer experience. Returns, remakes, and warranty questions are handled without the added friction of a cross-border process.
NewSmile night guards are fabricated to dental-lab standards using professional-grade materials. The soft night guard option at $129 CAD is designed for light-to-moderate grinders and provides cushioning between the upper and lower arches to reduce wear on enamel and reduce jaw muscle tension overnight.
If you are also looking to protect a completed orthodontic result, NewSmile offers a custom retainer Canada at $99 CAD — useful for patients who want both a retainer for their teeth and a separate night guard for bruxism protection.
| Feature | Sporting Smiles | NewSmile CA |
|---|---|---|
| Price | ~$149–$189 USD (priced in USD — Canadians pay exchange + duties) | $129 CAD |
| Ships to Canada | Yes — from US lab, buyer pays import duties and border fees | Yes — ships within Canada, no duties |
| Lab location | United States | Canada |
| Impression method | Mail-in impression kit (putty) | Mail-in impression kit |
| Turnaround | 2–3 weeks from impression receipt (cross-border shipping adds time) | Ships as soon as production is complete |
| Material options | Soft, hard, dual-laminate | Soft (dental-lab grade) |
| Canadian customer support | No — US-based only | Yes |
| Currency | USD only | CAD |
Sporting Smiles is a legitimate US dental lab with a reasonable product. For American customers, they offer solid value. For Canadian customers, the picture is more complicated.
When a Canadian orders from Sporting Smiles, the final cost involves at least three variables the buyer cannot fully control: the USD-to-CAD exchange rate at time of checkout, any applicable CBSA import duties, and international shipping fees. The listed USD price on the Sporting Smiles website is not the price you pay as a Canadian. On a $149 USD order, the combination of exchange rate and potential duties can add $30 to $60 CAD or more to the real cost — pushing it well above $200 CAD depending on conditions.
By contrast, NewSmile's $129 CAD price is the price. There are no conversion surprises.
If you specifically need a hard or dual-laminate night guard — which NewSmile does not currently offer — and you are a heavy grinder whose dentist has recommended a harder material, Sporting Smiles is one of the few mail-in options that provides that product. In that case, the cross-border costs may be worth it for the specific product you need. You should factor in the full landed cost when comparing.
For the majority of Canadians dealing with light-to-moderate teeth grinding — the most common presentation — a soft custom night guard is clinically appropriate. In that scenario, ordering from a Canadian company at a predictable CAD price, with Canadian customer service and no import friction, is the more straightforward choice.
Protect your teeth from grinding — without paying US exchange rates.
NewSmile's custom night guard is made in Canada for Canadians — $129 CAD, no border duties, no USD conversion surprises.
Yes, Sporting Smiles ships to Canada from their US lab. However, Canadian orders are priced in USD, and buyers are responsible for any import duties, taxes, and currency exchange fees assessed at the border. These costs are not included in the price shown on the Sporting Smiles website.
Costs vary by provider. NewSmile offers a custom night guard in Canada for $129 CAD with no import duties, since it ships domestically. US-based providers like Sporting Smiles list prices in USD and Canadian buyers pay exchange plus potential CBSA duties on top of that listed price.
A properly made custom night guard from a dental lab — whether ordered through a dentist or a direct-to-consumer lab using an impression kit — uses the same type of professional fabrication process. The quality of your impressions matters significantly. If impressions are unclear, a reputable lab will ask you to redo them before fabricating. For light-to-moderate grinding, a lab-fabricated soft guard from a mail-in service is clinically comparable to what many dentists prescribe, at a fraction of the in-office price.
A retainer holds your teeth in position after orthodontic treatment and is typically worn every night to prevent teeth from shifting. A night guard is designed to cushion the teeth and protect enamel from the forces of grinding and clenching during sleep. They serve different purposes and are not interchangeable, though some people who grind their teeth and have had orthodontic treatment choose to wear both. NewSmile offers both: a custom night guard Canada at $129 CAD and a custom retainer Canada at $99 CAD.
With regular cleaning and proper storage, a custom-fitted soft night guard typically lasts one to three years depending on the severity of grinding. Heavy grinders may wear through a soft guard faster. If your guard shows significant wear, develops cracks, or no longer fits comfortably due to dental work, it should be replaced. Most direct-to-consumer labs, including NewSmile, make replacement straightforward since your records are already on file.
