On implants vs bridge, a bridge is quicker and usually cheaper. An implant does not touch the neighbouring teeth and keeps the bone loaded. The right answer depends almost entirely on the condition of the two teeth either side of your gap.
Implants vs bridge turns on the neighbouring teeth
A conventional bridge is cemented onto the teeth either side of the gap, and to take crowns those teeth must be filed down. If they are already heavily filled or crowned, that is a reasonable use of them and a bridge makes sense. If they are pristine, you are removing healthy tooth structure that does not grow back, in order to solve a problem somewhere else.
That single question decides most implants vs bridge cases. Where the neighbours are sound, an implant leaves them alone entirely, which is covered on Single Tooth Implant. Where several teeth are missing in a row, the comparison shifts again toward an Implant Supported Bridge carried on posts rather than teeth.
Underneath both sits the bone question, set out on Jawbone Bone Loss.
Comparison
Four comparisons
Working through implants vs bridge, in four steps
Neighbouring teeth
A bridge prepares them and depends on them. An implant does neither. The biggest practical difference.
Time
A bridge can be fitted within weeks. An implant runs across months while the bone integrates.
Bone
A bridge sits above the gum, so the ridge underneath keeps shrinking. An implant loads it and slows that.
Cost over time
A bridge is cheaper today and typically replaced sooner. The comparison narrows the longer you look.
Being fair
When a bridge beats an implant
When the neighbouring teeth already need crowns anyway. When bone at the site is poor and grafting is unrealistic. When you need it finished in weeks rather than months. When surgery is unwise for medical reasons. And when the budget genuinely does not stretch, because a well made bridge now beats an implant you cannot afford for another three years.
What a bridge cannot do is stop the ridge underneath from shrinking, and that is worth understanding rather than discovering later. Costs for the implant route are on Single Implant Cost, the wider set of options where several teeth are gone on Full Mouth Restoration, and the denture comparison on Dentures Vs Implants.
Filled neighboursBridge suits
Sound neighboursImplant suits
LegitimateBoth
Read next
Either side of implants vs bridge in Victoria
One tooth, several teeth, or a removable alternative.
Cost, longevity, appearance and what happens if a bridge fails.
An implant post typically outlasts a bridge, which commonly needs replacing after ten to fifteen years. When a bridge is replaced, the supporting teeth are prepared again, and each cycle takes more of them. That compounding is the part people rarely factor in at the outset.
Up front, usually yes, though a three unit bridge involves three crowns and is not a small treatment. Over twenty years, with a replacement cycle and the possible loss of a supporting tooth, the gap narrows considerably and can reverse.
Most often one of the supporting teeth develops decay or a crack under the crown, sometimes discovered late because it is hidden. If that tooth cannot be saved you now have a two tooth gap rather than one, and the options get more expensive. That is the risk worth naming.
Not usually to the eye. Both can be made to look natural. The difference is at the gum line over years: an implant supports the tissue from underneath, while the ridge under a bridge continues to recede, which can eventually show as a gap beneath the false tooth.
You can, but the ridge will have shrunk further by then, so grafting becomes more likely. If an implant is your eventual intention, doing it sooner is usually simpler and cheaper than doing it after a bridge has run its course.
Victoria patients
What Victoria patients say after choosing
★★★★★4.9· 118 reviews on Google
★★★★★
Was going to have a bridge until they explained it meant filing down two healthy teeth.
F. Odukoya
Chose implant, Victoria
★★★★★
Asked for the comparison without being steered. Got it, including where a bridge still makes sense.
G. Marchetti
Wanted both sides, Langford
★★★★★
Old bridge failed and took a tooth with it. Exactly the risk described here. This time nothing healthy was touched.
K. Diallo
Replaced a failed bridge, Colwood
★★★★★
Both neighbours already had big fillings, so a bridge made sense for me. They said so rather than upselling.
H. Vukovic
Bridge was right, Saanich
From the blog
Victoria implant guides: comparisons, cost and healing
Get implants and a bridge priced side by side in Victoria
The comparison turns on the condition of the two teeth beside your gap, and that needs looking at rather than guessing. A consultation covers both routes with figures so the choice is yours to make on real information.
