6 Pack Replacement Heads for Sonicare

Pros: • They are toothbrushes • They fit the Sonicare elite series toothbrush handle • They look like, and fit like genuine sonicare brush heads • The brush itself seems decent • Gives the illusion of using an electric sonicare toothbrush • Quiet operation (when they don’t have much force) Cons: • They don’t work – the magnet appears weak and the vibrations are weak I needed replacement brush heads for my now aging Phillips Sonicare elite series electric toothbrush. Many retail stores have stopped carrying these, and the price has gone up considerably when you can find them online, including Amazon. So, I tried these BrightDeal brush heads. To be fair, they look extremely similar to the original brush heads. They fit on the Sonicare electric toothbrush handle with no problem. They are near identical in color, and the only obvious difference is a slight difference in the grip pattern, and the shape of the bristles themselves. The magnet on the bottom also looks similar. After putting them on the handle though the difference was far more obvious. These did vibrate, but not much. They were very noticeably quieter. They brush head did appear to vibrate in free space, however in the mouth when cleaning teeth they hardly move. The old, worn original cleaned better than the new one of these. I ended up using it like a manual toothbrush. I did end up eventually buying genuine Phillips Sonicare replacement brush heads at much higher price than these. They may cost more, but they actually work. It was like night and day going from the BrightDeal toothbrush for over a week while waiting for the Sonicare, and even with manually brushing my teeth didn’t feel clean. I used the sonicare and now my teeth feel better. The genuine sonicare is very noticeably louder, and has significantly more force on the brush to actually clean teeth. The BrightDeal merely give the impression of vibrating. They don’t move enough to clean teeth. Do yourself a favor, either get the genuine replacement heads, a newer model Sonicare with heads more available, or just use a manual toothbrush. Using these BrightDeal on the sonicare is essentially just a manual toothbrush with a clumsy handle. I believe the problem is with the magnets used on the BrightDeal brush heads. Phillips actually had a pretty poor design with the original elite series in that they attach expensive, high performance rare-earth magnets in the brush head. While this works quite well, it means that the magnets are disposed of and need to be replaced when the toothbrush bristles wear out. They have changed this design on their new models and no longer have expensive magnets on the disposable brush (although notably they didn’t reduce the price). These rare earth magnets (appear to be neodymium) are essential to the proper operation of the toothbrush. While the magnets on the BrightDeal brush heads look extremely similar to the Sonicare magnets, I expect they do not have the same magnetic properties and use cheaper materials. I did try simple tests sticking them to a piece of steel, and they both seem similar, but that really isn’t a sufficient test. I very rarely return anything from Amazon, but these are going back. They don’t work. I will likely give 2 stars just because they are a toothbrush, look like a toothbrush and fit the handle. I was very surprised given how many positive reviews these received. I don’t quite understand that unless people don’t recognize how much weaker these are than the original. I considered buying a newer model Sonicare toothbrush for better availability of replacement heads. I did ultimately buy replacements for the old Elite. When they are worn out it will be time to buy a new complete toothbrush. The old elite still works great though. I wish these heads would have worked out.