Free Dental CPD in Australia: Where to Find It and What to Check

Free dental CPD is easy to find and hard to trust. Type it into Google and you’ll get supplier webinars, overseas lecture libraries, and the occasional gem. The tricky part isn’t finding free hours, it’s finding free hours that actually change how you practise.

This post covers what counts towards your CPD requirements in Australia, where the genuinely good free education lives, and the questions worth asking before you give a webinar your evening.

First, what actually counts as CPD?

The Dental Board of Australia expects practising dentists, oral health therapists, dental hygienists and dental therapists to complete at least 60 hours of CPD across each three year cycle. The activities you claim need to be relevant to your scope of practice, and you need to keep your own records, because the Board can ask to see them. The full CPD registration standard is on the Dental Board of Australia website.

Nothing in that standard says CPD has to cost money. Free activities count exactly the same way paid ones do, provided they’re relevant to your scope, properly documented, and genuinely educational.

Is free dental CPD verifiable in Australia?

You’ll see CPD labelled “verifiable” and “non-verifiable” in a lot of course listings. Those labels come from overseas regulators, mainly in the UK, and the Dental Board of Australia doesn’t use them. What the Board asks for is a minimum of 60 hours over each three year cycle (the current cycle runs from 1 December 2025 to 30 November 2028), with at least 80 per cent of it clinically or scientifically based and all of it relevant to your scope. The detail is on the Board’s CPD page.

So in Australia, the useful question isn’t whether free CPD is verifiable, it’s whether you can show what you did if the Board asks. A certificate that states the topic, the presenter, the date and the hours does that job, whether the session was free or paid.

Free CPD for dental assistants and dental nurses

Dental assistants, often called dental nurses, aren’t registered with the Dental Board of Australia, so the 60 hour requirement doesn’t apply to them. That doesn’t make CPD any less useful. Plenty of dental assistants keep their own record of learning, and the same checklist below applies: clear learning objectives, an evidence-based presenter, and a certificate that states the hours.

Many clinical topics matter right across the dental team, and our webinars are open to dental assistants as well as registered practitioners. Every session comes with a certificate you can keep as a record of your learning.

Where to find free dental CPD

• Free live webinars from education providers. Many Australian providers, us included, run free webinars alongside their paid events. Ours come with clear learning objectives, MCQs for reflection, and a certificate for your records. You’ll find upcoming sessions on our webinars and events page.
• Your professional association. If you’re a member of the ADA or OHAA, your membership usually includes member webinars, journal access and clinical resources you’ve already paid for.
• Industry sponsored education. Suppliers and manufacturers fund a lot of free CPD, and some of it is excellent. Just keep an eye on the line between education and product placement, and note who is paying the presenter.
• Structured self-directed learning. Journal reading, journal clubs and online study can count towards your hours when you document what you learned and how it applies to your practice.

How to tell good free CPD from a sales pitch

Free is not the same as low value, but it’s also not the same as neutral. Before you commit an evening, check the session against this list:

• Learning objectives stated up front, so you know what you’re meant to walk away with.
• Evidence-based content with references, not just opinion and before-and-after photos.
• A named presenter with relevant credentials, and transparency about who is paying them.
• Some form of reflection or assessment, like MCQs, that helps the content stick.
• A certificate that states the hours, so your CPD record looks after itself.

If a session fails most of that list it might still be interesting, but be honest with yourself about whether it belongs in your CPD record.

Free dental CPD from Collective Dental Education

Some of our live webinars are free to attend, and every session we run, free or paid, is built the same way: evidence-based content, clear learning objectives, take-home resources, and a presenter we pay for their time. Free for you should never mean unpaid experts.

Browse all our dental CPD courses, or see what’s coming up on our webinars and events page. And if your goals for this cycle include supervising students or new graduates, our Clinical Educators CPD Course is a 16 hour program built exactly for that.

Free dental CPD in Australia is out there, and some of it is genuinely excellent. Wherever you find it, build your cycle around education that respects your time, whatever it costs.