Until recently, the viral constituents of the oral microbiome had only been examined in the context of their ability to cause disease and spread contagion. We now know that viruses are normal inhabitants of the healthy oral microbiome, and that a diverse population of both DNA and RNA viruses is found in saliva and subgingival plaque of healthy individuals. The most common oral viruses are cytomegalovirus, herpesvirus one through nine and papilloma virus. The types of viruses that inhabit an individual are highly subject‐specific, much more so than the types of bacteria. The oral virome also demonstrates significant gender‐specificity. The type of viral exposure an individual has had, and the nature of the shared living environment are two major determinants of individual viral signatures. It is also established that the majority of viral particles are derived from gram‐positive and gram‐negative bacteriophages rather than free‐living viruses.Once acquired, these viruses demonstrate remarkable colonization stability in the absence of extraneous influences such as local or systemic disease. Studies exploring the role of saliva as a diagnostic tool for viral diseases such as dengue, West Nile, SARS, chikungunya, MERS‐CoV, Ebola, Zika, and Yellow Fever have further expanded our knowledge of non‐oral viruses. Most of these investigations have reported that whereas viral RNA and viable virus were detected in saliva early in the course of disease, viral shedding did not persist after resolution of symptoms. However, influenza A and B were detected in 20 to 60% of asymptomatic individuals. Taken together, these studies suggest that (a) the oral viral community is acquired through a non‐random process of microbial assembly that is partly dictated by individual genotype (b) viral communities are temporally stable once acquired and (c) exogenous viruses are present in saliva during acute phase infection, but most do not persist following resolution of disease.