Dentists per capita in California, county by county

Name: California dentists per capita by county
Creator: Vetted Dentists

California has 8.6 licensed dentists for every 10,000 residents, but the figure runs from 14.2 in San Francisco County to none at all in Alpine and Sierra. This map counts every current dental license in the state file for November 2026.

Dentists per 10,000 residents, statewide: 8.6
Residents per dentist: 1,163
Highest county: 14.2
Counties below the statewide figure: 48 of 58

Dentists per 10,000 residents

Under 3.6
3.6 to 5.2
5.2 to 6.1
6.1 to 8.1
8.1 or more

Select a county for its figures. License data: November 2026.

What the map shows

Highest: San Francisco (14.2), Orange (14.0), Santa Clara (12.6), Placer (11.7) and San Mateo (11.7).
Lowest: Trinity (0.6), Yuba (1.0), Colusa (1.8), Imperial (2.0) and Glenn (2.1). Alpine and Sierra have no dentist on record.
The spread is wide. 48 of the 58 counties sit below the statewide figure of 8.6, because dentists are concentrated in a small number of counties, most of them on the coast or around San Francisco Bay.
Sedation is scarcer still. 3,010 dentists statewide hold a sedation or anesthesia permit, 7.6 for every 100,000 residents. Switch the map to see where they are.

Download the data (CSV)

All 58 counties, ranked

Rank	County	Dentists	Population	Per 10,000 residents	Residents per dentist	Sedation permit holders
1	San Francisco	1,174	826,079	14.2	704	83
2	Orange	4,415	3,149,507	14.0	713	333
3	Santa Clara	2,406	1,914,391	12.6	796	153
4	Placer	518	442,081	11.7	853	77
5	San Mateo	870	743,568	11.7	855	55
6	Marin	261	253,694	10.3	972	25
7	Contra Costa	1,154	1,170,070	9.9	1,014	114
8	Alameda	1,545	1,636,630	9.4	1,059	114
9	San Diego	3,006	3,282,248	9.2	1,092	412
10	Los Angeles	8,823	9,694,934	9.1	1,099	663
11	Sacramento	1,308	1,618,460	8.1	1,237	134
12	Napa	107	132,949	8.1	1,243	20
13	Sonoma	382	486,444	7.8	1,273	53
13	Ventura	652	830,851	7.8	1,274	64
15	San Luis Obispo	219	282,367	7.8	1,289	25
16	El Dorado	146	192,323	7.6	1,317	21
17	Tuolumne	38	53,160	7.2	1,399	7
18	Santa Cruz	179	258,852	6.9	1,446	21
19	San Bernardino	1,517	2,224,091	6.8	1,466	107
20	Lassen *	19	28,117	6.8	1,480	0
21	Santa Barbara	298	442,065	6.7	1,483	35
22	Fresno	683	1,035,456	6.6	1,516	71
23	Solano	278	455,376	6.1	1,638	36
24	Nevada	62	101,911	6.1	1,644	8
25	Sutter	58	98,787	5.9	1,703	4
26	Monterey	254	433,729	5.9	1,708	36
27	Butte	118	209,211	5.6	1,773	19
28	Shasta	98	181,648	5.4	1,854	12
29	Plumas *	10	18,583	5.4	1,858	2
30	Yolo	118	224,410	5.3	1,902	11
31	Amador *	22	41,876	5.3	1,903	0
32	Humboldt	69	131,647	5.2	1,908	5
32	Siskiyou *	22	42,013	5.2	1,910	0
34	Stanislaus	289	557,719	5.2	1,930	27
35	San Joaquin	422	823,815	5.1	1,952	45
36	Riverside	1,263	2,544,916	5.0	2,015	110
37	Mendocino	43	88,122	4.9	2,049	6
38	Tulare	232	485,146	4.8	2,091	24
39	Modoc *	4	8,426	4.8	2,106	1
40	Del Norte *	11	26,410	4.2	2,401	1
41	Mariposa *	7	16,918	4.1	2,417	1
42	Kern	373	927,068	4.0	2,485	39
43	Tehama	25	64,665	3.9	2,587	5
44	Inyo *	7	18,158	3.9	2,594	1
45	San Benito	25	70,082	3.6	2,803	5
46	Lake	24	67,772	3.5	2,824	3
47	Calaveras *	16	46,605	3.4	2,913	0
48	Kings	51	154,327	3.3	3,026	3
49	Merced	95	297,260	3.2	3,129	5
50	Madera	52	167,927	3.1	3,229	7
51	Mono *	3	12,505	2.4	4,168	2
52	Glenn *	6	28,141	2.1	4,690	0
53	Imperial	37	181,411	2.0	4,903	4
54	Colusa *	4	21,836	1.8	5,459	0
55	Yuba	9	88,691	1.0	9,855	1
56	Trinity *	1	15,720	0.6	15,720	0
57	Alpine *	0	1,043	0.0	n/a	0
57	Sierra *	0	3,098	0.0	n/a	0
	California	33,828	39,355,309	8.6	1,163	3,010

* Fewer than 50,000 residents. In counties this small the rate moves a lot when one dentist arrives or leaves.

How to read these figures

Address of record, not office. Each dentist is counted in the county of the address they have on record with the Dental Board of California. For some that is a home or mailing address, so a county where many dentists live can look better served than it is.
Licenses, not hours. A current license counts once, whether the dentist works full time, part time, teaches or is not seeing patients.
Not the whole picture of access. The figures say nothing about cost, which insurance plans are accepted, or how long patients wait. People also cross county lines for care.
Small counties swing. Where few people live, one dentist changes the rate sharply.

Method and sources

Dentists. We counted every dental license marked current in the Dental Board of California file that the Department of Consumer Affairs published for November 2026: 36,294 in all.
County. 2,441 of those dentists have an address outside California and are left out. For 925 dentists the file gives a California city but no county, so we used the county that at least nine in ten other dentists in that city are recorded under. 25 could not be placed and are left out. That leaves 33,828.
Sedation. A dentist counts once if they hold a current oral conscious sedation certificate, moderate sedation permit, general anesthesia permit or pediatric minimal sedation permit.
Population. US Census Bureau, Vintage 2025 Population Estimates (1 July 2025).
Rate. Dentists divided by population, times 10,000. Sedation permit holders are shown per 100,000.

Sources: Department of Consumer Affairs public information licensee lists and the US Census Bureau Population Estimates Program. The figures are rebuilt when the state file is refreshed.

Use this data

You are welcome to use the map, the figures and the CSV file with credit to Vetted Dentists and a link to this page. Each county page has a small figure you can embed on your own site. For a related finding, see our report on how many dentists in the federal registry have no current license.

Questions about dentists per capita in California

Which California county has the most dentists per capita?

San Francisco County, with 14.2 dentists per 10,000 residents, followed by Orange (14.0) and Santa Clara (12.6).

Which California counties have the fewest dentists per capita?

Alpine and Sierra have no dentist with an address of record in the county. Among the rest, Trinity County is lowest at 0.6 per 10,000, then Yuba (1.0) and Colusa (1.8).

How many dentists are there in California?

36,294 dentists held a current California license in November 2026. 33,853 of them have an address of record in California, which works out to 8.6 per 10,000 residents, or one dentist for every 1,163 people.

Does the map show where dentists practice?

Not exactly. It counts each dentist in the county of the address they have on record with the Dental Board of California. For some dentists that is a home or mailing address, not an office.