Two posts can carry three teeth.

When several teeth in a row are missing, you do not need an implant for every tooth. An implant-supported bridge carries a span of replacement teeth on posts at each end, the way a road bridge carries its deck on piers: two implants can hold three or four teeth, the span is fixed in place, and nothing rests on your gum or hooks onto natural teeth. Two posts, three teeth is the common arithmetic, and it is why this option costs meaningfully less than one implant per missing tooth while chewing nearly as well.

Against the conventional alternative, the comparison is the same one that runs through all implant dentistry: a traditional bridge for a multi-tooth gap either borrows natural teeth as anchors, grinding them down, or is not possible at all when the gap is too long, and either way the bone under the span keeps shrinking. Implant piers load the bone at each end and keep it.

The sequence mirrors single implant treatment with one more moving part: the cone beam scan maps the whole span, the posts are placed where bone is best, healing runs its months, and the bridge is then made as one piece and fixed to the posts. Cleaning is a daily habit worth naming before you commit: the span has undersides, and we teach you the threader, brush or water flosser routine that keeps the gum under it healthy, because that gum health is what the bridge's lifespan runs on.

Repairs, when they come years later, are usually component-level rather than start-over: a chipped tooth on the span can often be repaired or the bridge section remade while the posts stay exactly where they are, which is a structural advantage over tooth-anchored bridges, where a failed anchor tooth takes the whole construction with it.

Candidacy follows the same honest rules as every implant treatment here: the piers need bone, heavy smoking and uncontrolled diabetes work against healing and are discussed before placement rather than after, and gum disease anywhere in the mouth gets treated first, since an implant bridge planted next to untreated gum disease inherits the neighborhood's problems.

Position changes the design conversation. A span in the back of the mouth is engineered for load above all, with materials and pier placement chosen for chewing force; a span in the smile zone adds the esthetic problem of emerging from the gum convincingly, which is where the planning scan and the lab work earn their keep. During healing you are not left with a visible gap: a provisional solution covers the span until the fixed bridge is ready, and which provisional suits you is agreed before the first appointment, not improvised after it.

Cost sits between a single implant and a full arch, is quoted for your case, in writing for the asking before anything is scheduled, and follows the same insurance reality as all implant work: coverage varies by plan, we check yours when you share it, and financing through Cherry is available. If your gap keeps growing because remaining teeth are failing, read the All-on-X page too; sometimes the honest plan is the arch, not the span.