This is a crucial decision for your long-term oral health. While both options replace missing teeth effectively, dental implants are generally considered the superior standard of care. **Dental Implants**: - **Pros**: Preserves adjacent teeth, stimulating jawbone to prevent bone loss, looks and feels like a natural tooth, lasts a lifetime with care. - **Cons**: Higher initial cost, requires minor surgery, longer healing time (3-6 months). **Dental Bridges**: - **Pros**: Lower initial cost, faster completion (2-3 weeks), no surgery required. - **Cons**: Requires grinding down healthy adjacent teeth, doesn't prevent bone loss, average lifespan of 10-15 years, harder to clean under. **Why We Often Recommend Implants at Indira Dental Clinic**: Implants are a one-tooth solution for a one-tooth problem. A bridge requires sacrificing the structure of two healthy teeth to support one missing tooth. Over time, bridges may fail due to decay on the supporting teeth, while implants are immune to cavities. However, a bridge might be better if the adjacent teeth already need crowns or if you have insufficient bone for an implant.