The appreciation of the appearance of complete removable dental prostheses (CRDPs) manufactured by emerging novel manufacturing techniques, may be an important factor in patient acceptance. The aim of this randomized survey was to analyze the perception of the appearance of CRDPs manufactured by different conventional and CAD-CAM techniques by dental professionals and elder CRDP wearers. METHOD AND MATERIALS Four participant groups comprised of undergraduate students (n=10), postgraduate residents (n=10), dental technicians (n=10) and elder CRDP wearers (n=10) evaluated aspects of the appearance of identical maxillary CRDP specimens, manufactured by six different techniques: 1. conventional flask-pack-press (FP), 2. injection molded (IM), 3. natural gingiva finish followed by injection molding (NG) 4. CAD-CAM milled base with bonded prefabricated teeth (M), 5. fully milled including teeth (FM) and 6. rapid-prototyped including teeth (P). A randomized, blinded survey included 18 pairwise comparative assessments and 12 individual judgements of the CRDP specimens. Statistical analyses included parametric- and nonparametric tests as well as linear regression models; the level of statistical significance was set at p<.05. RESULTS NG was preferred most often by the professional groups but least by the elder CRDP wearers (p<.05). P attracted the lowest scores from all four participant groups (p<.05). CRDP wearers were less severe in their judgements and showed in general a smaller range of ratings. The other four CRDP groups (FP, IM, M, and FM) were ranked differently depending on the participant groups. The three dental professional groups judged CRDPs with prefabricated teeth better than those with milled, printed or darker shade teeth. The participants’ gender had no influence on their scoring. CONCLUSIONS The findings of this study revealed marked differences in the assessment of CRDP esthetics between dental professionals and elder CRDP wearers, which may be important in denture acceptance. A shared and informed approach to decision making concerning the CRDP appearance might foster the treatment success.