Clear aligners are marketed as braces without the downside. For some mouths that is true. For others they are the wrong tool, and finding out at month fourteen is expensive.
What aligners do well
Mild to moderate crowding, spacing, and relapse after earlier treatment. They come out to eat and brush, which is better for the teeth over the course of treatment, and nobody has to see them.
What braces still do better
Big movements: rotating a tooth a long way, pulling one down from the gum, correcting a bite where the jaws do not meet properly. Braces push and pull with wires; aligners nudge with plastic, and there are movements plastic simply cannot make. An orthodontist will tell you which case you are.
The question is not which one you would rather wear. It is which one can finish the job — and only then, of those, which you would rather wear.
The part nobody mentions
Aligners only work while they are in — twenty-two hours a day. A teenager who takes them out for lunch and forgets them until dinner is not being treated. Braces do not have that problem, which is why many orthodontists still prefer them for younger patients.
Cost
Roughly comparable for comparable cases; the range is wide and depends on how much has to move. Mail-order aligners without an orthodontist involved are cheaper, and are the thing dentists spend the most time undoing.
