What is a digital dental lab?

A digital dental laboratory designs and produces restorations from digital scans instead of stone models and hand waxing. The case arrives as a file, is designed in CAD software, and is manufactured by a milling machine or 3D printer. Nothing about the process requires the laboratory to be near your practice.

The three parts of a digital laboratory

It helps to separate the workflow into three stages, because a laboratory may offer one, two or all three of them.

• Design — a CAD technician turns your scan into a manufacturable restoration file
• Manufacture — the file is milled or printed in the chosen material
• Finishing — staining, glazing, layering and quality control before delivery

Why the design step is the one that travels

Design is pure data. A designer in another country can open your scan, produce the restoration and return the file in hours, with no courier and no customs. Manufacture, by contrast, produces a physical object that has to reach the patient — which is why many practices now buy design remotely and mill locally, or in-house.

This is exactly the split LabMatch is built around: you send the scan, receive a quote, approve the design, pay, and download the file.

What a digital laboratory needs from you

The quality of the output is decided almost entirely by what you send. A complete scan and a specific prescription remove most of the back-and-forth.

• Both arches and an accurate bite scan
• STL, PLY or OBJ export from your scanner
• Material, shade and margin preferences
• Photographs for anterior and aesthetic cases
• The deadline, and whether the case is a rush

Traditional versus digital: what actually changes

Digital does not automatically mean better — a poor scan produces a poor restoration just as a poor impression did. What changes is the speed of the loop, the ability to review a design before anything is manufactured, and the fact that you are no longer limited to the laboratories within driving distance of your practice.

How to start

Send one straightforward case — a single posterior crown is ideal — to two laboratories and compare the design, the communication and the price. It is a low-risk way to find out how a remote workflow fits your practice before you move volume.