Periodontitis is the sixth most common chronic non‑infectious disease in the world. It mainly leads to the inflammatory destruction of periodontal supporting tissue, which has become the main cause of tooth loss in adults. Periodontitis is also a risk factor for various systemic diseases. Noncoding ribonucleic acids (ncRNAs) are important regulators of normal biological processes and their abnormal expression has been shown to be important to the pathogenesis of inflammatory diseases, including periodontitis. Biologically, they can regulate immune inflammation, bone homeostasis and cell proliferation in periodontitis. Clinically, they are promising diagnostic markers and therapeutic targets. Recent advances in technology have opened up new directions for the study of ncRNAs, including RNA secondary structures, RNA protein interactions, ncRNA‑encoded peptides or proteins and single‑cell RNA sequencing. Therefore, the present study summarized the function and mechanisms of ncRNAs in periodontitis, as well as their clinical potential for diagnosis and treatment and highlight these exciting areas of research.