01 A full arch
All-on-4: a full arch of fixed teeth
Four implants, one fixed bridge, and teeth on the day of surgery.
- Cost
- From £12,500
- Typical range
- £12,500 – £15,000
- Time
- Surgery day, then 4 months
This page covers one part of what we do. The full picture is on dental implants in Belfast.
02 Suitability
Is All-on-4 right for you?
A good fit if…
- You have lost most or all of the teeth in one jaw, or they are failing together
- You want teeth that are fixed in place and do not come out at night
- You have been told you need extensive grafting for conventional implants
- You can manage cleaning beneath a bridge with a brush and a threader every day
Probably not if…
- You have enough healthy teeth left that saving them is the better plan
- You want individual teeth you can floss between — a fixed arch is one piece
- Heavy smoking or uncontrolled diabetes has not been addressed
- You need the lowest possible cost, in which case a denture is the honest answer
03 Process
How it works
The full six-step process, including what happens after the teeth are fitted, is on the pillar page.
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01 90 minutes
Consultation and 3D scan
A longer appointment than usual. Scan, photographs, a discussion about what the finished teeth should look like, and a written plan.
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02 2–3 weeks
Planning and the printed guide
Implant positions are planned on the scan, the surgical guide is printed here, and your temporary bridge is made in our laboratory before you arrive.
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03 3–4 hours
Surgery day
Any remaining teeth are removed, four implants are placed, and a fixed temporary bridge is screwed into place the same afternoon. You leave with teeth.
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04 4 months
Healing on the temporary
A soft diet for the first six weeks. Reviews at one week, one month and three months, adjusting the bridge as the gum settles.
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05 3 appointments over 4 weeks
The final bridge
Scans, a try-in you can see and comment on before anything is finished, then the definitive bridge fitted.
04 The price
What’s included
From £12,500
Typically £12,500 – £15,000. Surgery day, then 4 months.
- CBCT scan, photographs and a written plan
- Extraction of any remaining teeth in that jaw
- Four implants placed through a printed surgical guide
- A fixed temporary bridge on the day of surgery
- The final bridge, made in our own laboratory
- Reviews through the first year
- Five-year guarantee on the implants, two years on the bridge
05 In detail
What the angle is for
The idea behind All-on-4 is straightforward once you see where the bone goes.
When teeth are lost, the ridge shrinks — and it shrinks most at the back, where the molars were, and least at the front. In the upper jaw the sinus expands downwards into the space the molar roots used to occupy. In the lower jaw the nerve canal ends up closer to the surface as the ridge above it reduces.
The old solution was to build the bone back: sinus grafts, block grafts, six to twelve months of healing, and a significant addition to the cost. All-on-4 takes the opposite approach. Instead of rebuilding bone at the back, it tilts the two rear implants forward at around thirty degrees so they engage the solid bone at the front and their heads emerge further back — far enough back to support a full arch of teeth without grafting.
It is not a compromise version of implant treatment. Tilted implants have been studied for over two decades and their survival rates match upright ones. What it does is convert a case that needed a year and a graft into a case that needs a day.
The bit people are not told beforehand
Two things about a fixed arch are worth knowing before you commit, and they are not always volunteered.
The first is that it is one piece. You do not floss between the teeth because there is nothing between them to floss — you clean underneath the whole bridge, along the join with the gum, with a threader or a small brush, every day. That is a genuine change of habit. People who will not do it get inflammation under the bridge, and it is not visible until it is advanced.
The second is speech. For the first week or two some sounds are different, particularly S and F. The bridge occupies a slightly different amount of space than your own teeth did, and the tongue has to relearn where it is. It resolves for almost everyone, and it is unsettling if nobody has warned you.
The four months on the temporary
The temporary bridge is not a placeholder to be endured. It is the working prototype.
You wear it while the gum settles into its final shape, which takes months. Over that time we adjust it — length, the way the teeth meet, the curve of the front teeth against your lip. Anything you dislike about it is information we use, and it is far easier to change a temporary than a finished bridge.
Which is also why we do not rush to the final. A definitive bridge made at eight weeks, before the tissue has stopped changing, will fit a mouth that no longer exists a few months later.
When we say no
We turn down All-on-4 cases regularly, and for two reasons.
The first is when there are still teeth worth keeping. Removing sound teeth to fit a fixed arch is an irreversible act, and the fact that a patient is exhausted by dentistry is not a clinical indication. If eight of your teeth have twenty years left in them, we will tell you that.
The second is when the daily cleaning is not going to happen. A fixed arch that is not maintained will fail — later than a neglected natural tooth, but it will fail, and rather more expensively. That is a conversation we would rather have at the consultation than at the two-year review.
06 A case
An upper arch replaced in a day
Nine remaining upper teeth, all mobile, held together by years of patching.
- Treatment
- All-on-4, upper arch
- Time
- Surgery day, then 5 months
- Cost
- £13,400
Illustrative example — not a photograph of a patient.
07 Alternatives
What we’d also mention
We would rather you chose the right treatment than the one on this page.
A full denture
Around £1,600 against £12,500, and available in six weeks. It comes out, it rests on a ridge that continues to shrink beneath it, and in the lower jaw it very often will not stay put. For some people it is still the right answer, and we will say so.
Six or eight implants with individual crowns
More like natural teeth, cleanable between each one, and considerably more expensive — usually £20,000 or more per arch. It also needs bone in places All-on-4 deliberately avoids, which often means grafting and another six months.
01 Do I really leave with teeth on the same day?
Yes, and they are fixed rather than a denture laid over the top. The temporary bridge is made in our laboratory beforehand from the planning scan, then adjusted and screwed onto the implants at the end of the surgery. You will not go home without teeth, and nobody here has.
02 Why four and not six or eight?
Because four implants, with the back two angled forward, engage the denser bone at the front of the jaw and reach past the sinus and the nerve — which is precisely where the bone people have usually lost the most. More implants means more surgery and, very often, grafting that four angled implants make unnecessary.
03 Does it feel like having my own teeth back?
Closer than a denture by a wide margin, but it is one piece rather than separate teeth, and you clean underneath it rather than between each tooth. Most people adapt within a fortnight. Speech takes a few days to settle and certain sounds feel odd at first.
04 What if an implant fails later?
A bridge on four implants has some tolerance — losing one is a problem to be solved rather than a collapse. Depending on which one and where, we either replace it or redesign the bridge onto the remaining three. This is uncommon, and it is why the review appointments exist.
Related treatments
Karen Doherty · Treatment coordinator
Not sure where to start?
Karen will talk you through the options — what your situation usually needs, what it costs and what it involves. A callback is free and carries no obligation; the consultation, with the examination and 3D scan, is £95.
Not ready to speak to anybody? Download the price guide (PDF) — every figure we charge, on one page.
Or ring the clinic directly on 028 9649 6180.