How to build yolov8 dental object detection model

Last Updated on 21/11/2025 by Eran Feit

Getting started with YOLOv8 dental object detection

In modern dentistry, X-rays are no longer just static images on a screen. With yolov8 dental object detection, those images can be transformed into structured data that highlights teeth, restorations, lesions, and other findings automatically. Instead of manually scanning every millimeter of a radiograph, a trained YOLOv8 model can detect relevant structures in a single pass, drawing bounding boxes and assigning labels in real time.

YOLOv8 is a state-of-the-art object detection framework designed for speed and accuracy, which makes it well suited for clinical and research scenarios where both reliability and performance matter. By learning from annotated dental X-rays, YOLOv8 can adapt to the unique contrast patterns, artifacts, and anatomy present in panoramic, bitewing, and periapical images. This allows it to generalize across different patients, imaging devices, and acquisition settings while maintaining strong detection performance.

When applied to dental imaging, YOLOv8 dental object detection can support tasks such as tooth numbering, identifying missing or impacted teeth, flagging potential caries, and detecting existing restorations. Models trained on large, well-labeled datasets have achieved high precision and recall in identifying permanent and deciduous teeth across multiple X-ray types, demonstrating that deep learning can complement the expertise of dentists rather than replace it.

A typical workflow starts with collecting and labeling a dataset of dental X-rays, defining the objects of interest (for example, individual teeth or specific conditions), and configuring a data file that YOLOv8 can read. From there, you train the model using a GPU-enabled Python environment, monitor metrics like mAP and F1-score, and refine the training setup as needed. Once the model is ready, you run inference on new X-rays and visualize the results with bounding boxes overlaid on the images to compare predictions with ground truth or clinician annotations.

If you enjoy building custom detectors like this, you might also like my How to Train YOLOv5 on a Custom Dataset tutorial for another end-to-end object detection pipeline.

Why yolov8 dental object detection is worth learning

Yolov8 dental object detection is valuable because it brings consistent, repeatable analysis to an area that traditionally relies on manual inspection. Even experienced clinicians can have subtle differences in how they interpret radiographs, especially when dealing with large volumes of images. A well-trained YOLOv8 model applies the same criteria every time it processes an X-ray, which can help with standardizing documentation, tracking changes over time, and supporting decision-making.

Another strength of YOLOv8 in dental applications is its efficiency. The model is designed as a one-stage detector, which keeps inference times low enough for potential real-time use in clinics. That means dental practices and research labs can integrate object detection into their workflows without adding significant delays, whether they are running batch analyses of epidemiological datasets or providing instant feedback during patient consultations.

From a development perspective, working with yolov8 dental object detection is approachable for anyone familiar with Python and basic deep learning concepts. You can set up a conda environment, install PyTorch and Ultralytics YOLO, download an annotated dental dataset, and start training a custom model in relatively few steps. The configuration files are human-readable, and the training API exposes parameters like epochs, batch size, and image size, giving you fine-grained control over the learning process.

Finally, this type of model opens the door to more advanced pipelines. Once you can reliably detect teeth and other structures, you can extend the system to segmentation, measurement, or even automated reporting that summarizes findings in natural language. Combined with clinical expertise, yolov8 dental object detection becomes a foundation for intelligent tools that improve efficiency, support early detection of problems, and enhance communication with patients.

Walking through our YOLOv8 dental object detection tutorial

This tutorial walks you step by step through a complete yolov8 dental object detection pipeline, from a blank environment to a trained model that can detect teeth on X-ray images.
The code is written in Python and uses a combination of Conda, PyTorch, the Ultralytics YOLOv8 package, OpenCV, and a labeled dental dataset from Roboflow.
The goal is that you can copy the code into your own environment, make small path adjustments, and quickly reproduce the same results on your machine.

The first part of the code focuses on setting up a clean working environment.
You create and activate a Conda environment, install the correct CUDA-enabled PyTorch version, and then install YOLOv8 from Ultralytics.
This ensures that GPU acceleration works out of the box and that your training loop will run efficiently on modern hardware.

Next, the tutorial code prepares the data.
You download a dental X-ray dataset, organize the images and YOLO-format label files into train and validation folders, and load the data.yaml configuration to read the class names.
There is also a dedicated section that loads a single image and its label file, converts YOLO coordinates to pixel coordinates, and uses OpenCV to draw bounding boxes and class names.
This small visualization step is crucial, because it lets you verify that the annotations are correct before investing time in model training.

The core of the script is the training function.
Here, you initialize a YOLOv8 model from a configuration file (for example, yolov8l.yaml), point it to your data.yaml, and launch training with parameters such as number of epochs, batch size, project folder, and experiment name.
YOLOv8 handles the full training loop, saving metrics and model weights (including best.pt) into a well-organized results directory that you can revisit later.

Finally, the last part of the tutorial loads the trained model and runs inference on a test image.
The code draws predicted bounding boxes and labels on a copy of the original X-ray, and then reconstructs the ground-truth boxes from the label file for side-by-side comparison.
By saving and displaying both images, you can visually inspect how well the YOLOv8 model learned to perform dental object detection and decide whether you want to fine-tune, add more data, or move on to integrating the model into a larger application.

For more practice with custom datasets, take a look at How to Train Detectron2 on Custom Object Detection Data , where we register COCO-style annotations and train a flexible Detectron2 model.

Link to the video tutorial : https://youtu.be/mfv1ps-tHDk

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Link for medium users : https://medium.com/object-detection-tutorials/how-to-build-yolov8-dental-object-detection-model-07ee6ee36296

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Walking through our YOLOv8 dental object detection tutorial

This tutorial shows how to build a complete yolov8 dental object detection pipeline using Python.
You start from a clean Conda environment and finish with a trained YOLOv8 model that can detect teeth on dental X-rays.

The goal is to make each step copy-paste friendly so you can focus on understanding what the code does.
You will see how to install the right libraries, organize your dental X-ray dataset, train the model, and visualize results with OpenCV.

Along the way, you will also learn how YOLO format labels work, how to convert normalized coordinates into pixel coordinates, and how to compare predictions with ground truth boxes.
These skills are reusable for any custom object detection project, not only dental images.

By the end of this post, you will have a practical workflow for yolov8 dental object detection that you can reuse on other medical or industrial datasets.
You can then extend the same pattern to more tooth classes, different pathologies, or even other imaging modalities.

Setting up the environment for YOLOv8 dental object detection

Before training a model, you need a clean Python environment with compatible versions of CUDA, PyTorch, and YOLOv8.
Here you will create a Conda environment, install GPU-enabled PyTorch, and add the Ultralytics package.

### Create a new Conda environment for the YOLOv8 dental project. conda create --name YoloV8 python=3.8  ### Activate the environment so all packages are isolated from your base setup. conda activate YoloV8  ### Check that the NVIDIA CUDA compiler is installed and on your PATH. nvcc --version  ### Install PyTorch, TorchVision, and Torchaudio with CUDA 11.8 support from the official channels. conda install pytorch==2.1.1 torchvision==0.16.1 torchaudio==2.1.1 pytorch-cuda=11.8 -c pytorch -c nvidia  ### Install the Ultralytics package that provides the YOLOv8 implementation. pip install ultralytics==8.1.0 

After running these commands, you have a dedicated environment that is ready for yolov8 dental object detection experiments.
Keeping YOLOv8 and PyTorch in their own Conda env helps avoid version conflicts with other projects.

Organizing the dental dataset for YOLOv8

YOLOv8 expects your images and labels to be organized in a consistent folder structure.
Each image in the training, validation, and test sets has a matching text file with YOLO-format bounding boxes.

A typical layout for this dental project looks like this.

data/     train/         images/         labels/     valid/         images/         labels/     test/         images/         labels/     data.yaml 

The data.yaml file describes where the images live and which classes the model should learn.
For a simple tooth detection task, it might contain a single class such as "tooth" or several classes if you distinguish between different tooth types.

Once this structure is in place, YOLOv8 can iterate over your dental images, read the labels, and optimize the yolov8 dental object detection model without confusion.
Verifying that paths and filenames match exactly will save you a lot of debugging time later.

Visualizing a labeled dental X-ray with bounding boxes

Before training, it is smart to verify that your YOLO labels actually line up with the teeth on the image.
This script loads one dental image, reads the corresponding label file, converts YOLO coordinates to pixel coordinates, and draws bounding boxes with OpenCV.

### Import YOLO class from the Ultralytics package so we can work with YOLOv8 models. from ultralytics import YOLO  ### Import OpenCV for reading images and drawing bounding boxes. import cv2  ### Import yaml to read the dataset configuration and class names. import yaml  ### Path to a sample training image with dental annotations. img = "C:/Data-sets/teeth2/train/images/IMG_2135_JPG.rf.b7605f894721641aca14678cbdc8b2f7.jpg"  ### Path to the corresponding YOLO label file for that image. imgAnotation = "C:/Data-sets/teeth2/train/labels/IMG_2135_JPG.rf.b7605f894721641aca14678cbdc8b2f7.txt"  ### Path to the YOLOv8 data configuration YAML that contains class names and dataset paths. data_yaml_file = "C:/Data-sets/teeth2/data.yaml"  ### Open the YAML file in read mode so we can parse it. with open(data_yaml_file, 'r') as file:     ### Load the YAML content into a Python dictionary.     data = yaml.safe_load(file)  ### Extract the list of class names from the configuration. label_names = data['names']  ### Print the class names to confirm the config is loaded correctly. print(label_names)  ### Read the dental X-ray image from disk. img = cv2.imread(img)  ### Get the image height, width, and number of channels. H, W, _ = img.shape  ### Open the YOLO label file and read all of its lines. with open(imgAnotation, 'r') as file:     lines = file.readlines()  ### Prepare an empty list to store parsed annotation tuples. annotations = []  ### Loop over each line and parse the YOLO annotation. for line in lines:     ### Split the line into class ID and normalized box coordinates.     values = line.split()     ### The first value is the class label ID.     label = values[0]     ### The remaining values are center x, center y, width, and height in YOLO format.     x, y, w, h = map(float, values[1:])     ### Add the parsed annotation as a tuple to the list.     annotations.append((label, x, y, w, h))  ### Print the parsed annotations to verify they were read correctly. print(annotations)  ### Loop over each annotation and draw the bounding box on the image. for annotation in annotations:     ### Unpack the label and YOLO coordinates.     label, x, y, w, h = annotation     ### Convert the class ID into a human-readable label name.     label_name = label_names[int(label)]      ### Convert YOLO normalized coordinates into absolute pixel coordinates.     x1 = int((x - w / 2) * W)     y1 = int((y - h / 2) * H)     x2 = int((x + w / 2) * W)     y2 = int((y + h / 2) * H)      ### Draw a green bounding box around the detected tooth.     cv2.rectangle(img, (x1, y1), (x2, y2), (0, 255, 0), 1)      ### Put the class name slightly above the bounding box.     cv2.putText(img, label_name, (x1, y1 - 5), cv2.FONT_HERSHEY_COMPLEX, 0.5, (0, 255, 0), 1, cv2.LINE_AA)  ### Save the visualization to disk so you can inspect it later. cv2.imwrite("c:/temp/1.png", img)  ### Show the image in a window. cv2.imshow("img", img)  ### Wait for a key press before closing the window. cv2.waitKey(0) 

If the boxes sit neatly on top of the teeth, your labels are correct and you can move on to training.
If they are shifted or scaled incorrectly, check your image sizes, label paths, and any preprocessing steps before continuing.

Training the YOLOv8 dental object detection model

Now you are ready to train the yolov8 dental object detection model on your custom dataset.
This script loads a YOLOv8 architecture, points it to the data.yaml file, and launches the training process with chosen hyperparameters.

### Import the YOLO class from Ultralytics so we can create and train models. from ultralytics import YOLO  ### Define the main entry point of the training script. def main():     ### Load a YOLOv8 model architecture from its YAML configuration file.     model = YOLO("yolov8l.yaml")      ### Path to the data configuration file that describes our dental dataset.     config_file_path = "C:/Data-sets/teeth2/data.yaml"      ### Define the root folder where YOLOv8 will store all training outputs.     project = "C:/Data-sets/teeth2"      ### Give a name to this specific experiment so results go into a dedicated subfolder.     experiment = "My-Teeth-Model"      ### Set the training batch size to control how many images run in parallel on the GPU.     batch_size = 16      ### Launch the training process with our configuration and hyperparameters.     results = model.train(         data=config_file_path,         epochs=100,         project=project,         name=experiment,         batch=batch_size,         device=0,         val=True,     )      ### After training, results and weights will be saved under project/experiment.     print(results)  ### Make sure main() runs only when this script is executed directly. if __name__ == "__main__":     main() 

During training, YOLOv8 logs metrics such as loss and mean average precision so you can track how well the model is learning.
The best weights are saved under C:/Data-sets/teeth2/My-Teeth-Model/weights/best.pt, which you will use for inference on new dental X-rays.

If you want to compare YOLOv8 with other modern detectors, you can follow my Getting Started with YOLOX for Object Detection and SSD MobileNet v3 Object Detection Explained for Beginners guides.

Running predictions and comparing with ground truth

Once training is complete, you can load the best checkpoint and run yolov8 dental object detection on test images.
This script draws both the predicted bounding boxes and the ground truth boxes so you can visually compare how well the model performs.

### Import the YOLO class to load the trained model for inference. from ultralytics import YOLO  ### Import OpenCV for image handling and drawing results. import cv2  ### Import os to help build file paths in a platform-independent way. import os  ### Path to a test dental X-ray image. imgTest = "C:/Data-sets/teeth2/test/images/IMG_5623_JPG.rf.0c498b907e44fe1bdba6ee17166bee3e.jpg"  ### Path to the ground truth YOLO label file for that test image. imgAnot = "C:/Data-sets/teeth2/test/labels/IMG_5623_JPG.rf.0c498b907e44fe1bdba6ee17166bee3e.txt"  ### Read the test image from disk. img = cv2.imread(imgTest)  ### Get the image height, width, and number of channels. H, W, _ = img.shape  ### Create a copy of the image to draw model predictions on. imgPredict = img.copy()  ### Build the path to the trained model weights (best checkpoint). model_path = os.path.join("C:/Data-sets/teeth2/My-Teeth-Model", "weights", "best.pt")  ### Load the trained YOLOv8 model from the weights file. model = YOLO(model_path)  ### Set a confidence threshold to filter out weak detections. threshold = 0.5  ### Run the model on the copied image to get predictions. results = model(imgPredict)  ### YOLOv8 returns a list of results, so take the first one. results = results[0]  ### Loop over each detected box with its coordinates, score, and class ID. for result in results.boxes.data.tolist():     ### Unpack bounding box coordinates, confidence score, and class ID.     x1, y1, x2, y2, score, class_id = result      ### Draw only boxes whose confidence is above the chosen threshold.     if score > threshold:         ### Draw a green rectangle for the predicted bounding box.         cv2.rectangle(imgPredict, (int(x1), int(y1)), (int(x2), int(y2)), (0, 255, 0), 1)         ### Put the predicted class name above the box in uppercase.         cv2.putText(             imgPredict,             results.names[int(class_id)].upper(),             (int(x1), int(y1 - 10)),             cv2.FONT_HERSHEY_SIMPLEX,             0.5,             (0, 255, 0),             1,             cv2.LINE_AA,         )  ### Create another copy of the original image to draw ground truth boxes. imgTrue = img.copy()  ### Open the ground truth label file and read its lines. with open(imgAnot, 'r') as file:     lines = file.readlines()  ### Prepare a list to store parsed ground truth annotations. annotations = []  ### Parse each line into a class ID and YOLO-format bounding box. for line in lines:     ### Split the line into separate values.     values = line.split()     ### The first value is the ground truth class ID as a string.     label = values[0]     ### The rest are center x, center y, width, and height in YOLO format.     x, y, w, h = map(float, values[1:])     ### Append the annotation to the list.     annotations.append((label, x, y, w, h))  ### Loop through the ground truth annotations and draw them. for annotation in annotations:     ### Unpack label and YOLO coordinates.     label, x, y, w, h = annotation      ### Convert the numeric label into the same class name mapping used by the model.     label = results.names[int(label)].upper()      ### Convert YOLO normalized coordinates into pixel coordinates.     x1 = int((x - w / 2) * W)     y1 = int((y - h / 2) * H)     x2 = int((x + w / 2) * W)     y2 = int((y + h / 2) * H)      ### Draw the ground truth bounding box on the image.     cv2.rectangle(imgTrue, (x1, y1), (x2, y2), (0, 255, 0), 1)      ### Put the ground truth label above the box.     cv2.putText(imgTrue, label, (x1, y1 - 5), cv2.FONT_HERSHEY_COMPLEX, 0.5, (0, 255, 0), 1, cv2.LINE_AA)  ### Save the ground truth visualization to disk. cv2.imwrite("c:/temp/imgTrue.png", imgTrue)  ### Save the predictions visualization to disk. cv2.imwrite("c:/temp/imgPredict.png", imgPredict)  ### Show the predicted boxes window. cv2.imshow("Img Predict", imgPredict)  ### Show the ground truth boxes window. cv2.imshow("Img True", imgTrue)  ### Also show the original image for reference. cv2.imshow("Original ", img)  ### Wait for a key press before closing the windows. cv2.waitKey(0) 

Looking at the three windows side by side helps you understand where your model is strong and where it still struggles.
You can adjust training epochs, dataset size, or augmentation strategies based on these visual comparisons.

Once you are comfortable with bounding boxes, you can move on to pixel-level masks by pairing detection and segmentation in my Segment Anything Tutorial: Generate YOLOv8 Masks Fast post.

FAQ: Yolov8 dental object detection

Conclusion

You have now walked through an end-to-end yolov8 dental object detection workflow, from environment setup to visualizing predictions.
Starting with a clean Conda environment, you installed GPU-accelerated PyTorch and Ultralytics YOLOv8 so that training runs reliably and efficiently.

You organized a dental X-ray dataset into the structure YOLOv8 expects, verified annotations by drawing bounding boxes, and trained a model that learns to detect teeth automatically.
By saving and reusing the best weights, you turned that training process into a practical inference pipeline that can be applied to new X-rays.

Along the way, you also saw how to compare predictions with ground truth and how to interpret common issues such as misaligned boxes or memory errors.
These patterns generalize well to other medical imaging tasks, so you can reuse the same approach with different classes, modalities, or detection targets.

With this foundation in place, you can keep iterating on data quality, model size, and training settings to push performance further.
From here, you might expand into segmentation, multi-task models, or even automated reporting that combines YOLOv8 outputs with clinical rules.

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