Whole-arch implant work · counted, not estimated
Arch Reckoner is about replacing one jaw’s worth of teeth with implants — all-on-4 and its variants, implant-supported and snap-on dentures, and the phrase “permanent dentures”. Every figure here is read off a published document, dated, and shown with the arithmetic attached.
Most pages about full-mouth implants open with a five-figure range and never say where it came from. We looked for a free, public, national average retail price for this work in the United States on 24 September 2026 and could not find one, so there is no invented range anywhere on this site.
What there is instead is the ladder of procedure codes a whole-arch case is billed on, and what three named payers allow for each line: the cost of a full arch, counted. Four implants and one upper prosthesis works out at $5,050.00 at New York's allowed amounts, $10,861.45 at Michigan's for the fixed version, and $0.00 in Delaware, where every implant code is printed on the schedule with nothing against it.
Somebody about to be quoted for a full arch is in an unusual position: the sum is larger than most medical bills they will ever see, the work is irreversible, and the only number they have been given is a headline. This site exists to turn that headline back into its parts, so a plan can be read rather than believed.
It will not tell you what your mouth needs. Nobody here is a dentist, nothing here is reviewed by one, and the only person who can answer that is one who has examined you.
"Permanent dentures" is one of the most searched phrases in this subject and one we will never use as a claim. We explain it — a fixed prosthesis is one you cannot remove at home, which is a statement about attachment, not lifespan — and we quote the source that says the denture on top of implants needs replacing every 15 to 20 years. The same goes for "painless", "guaranteed" and "lifetime": in quotation marks, as things people are told, never in our own voice.
No clinic, chain or dental group is named, ranked, recommended or linked here, in any country. There is no quote form, so nothing about your teeth is ever collected. Exactly two outbound links earn a commission — a discount-plan marketplace and a dentist booking service, neither of which buys an implant — and both are itemised on how this site is paid, along with what has been refused.
There is no published national price we could verify. What we can show is what published payers allow for each code: four implants plus a fixed upper prosthesis comes to $10,861.45 at Michigan's allowed amounts, while a lender's consumer guide reports an average charge of $15,176 per arch within a range of $11,640 to $27,500. Both, with their sources, are on the cost page.
The prosthesis is fixed, which means you cannot take it out at home. The patient source we quote says the denture sitting on implants needs replacing every 15 to 20 years, so the word describes how it is attached rather than how long it lasts.
There is no fixed answer, and the prosthesis codes do not record the number. A 2024 review of fixed full-arch techniques describes three or more implants as the common denominator, with extensive support for the four-implant concept; your own number comes from imaging and an examination.
Rarely in full. Medicare names implants among the things it does not cover, Medicaid sets no minimum adult dental benefit and leaves it to states, and private plans are limited by an annual maximum that is usually a fraction of an arch. Ask for a pre-treatment estimate against the specific codes.
An editorial desk with no dental qualifications, which is why every page says so near the top. We read published fee schedules, regulators and clinical reviews, and we name each one where we use it.
The material of a fixed arch changes what fails, how it is repaired and what it costs — and not one of the three published fee schedules we read prices a prosthesis by material. That absence is the most useful fact on this page.
Two more implants means two more surgical lines on the bill and a different set of supports under the same bridge. What it does not mean is a published verdict — no source we could read says one layout beats the other for a given jaw.
All-on-X is what the industry writes when it means “a fixed arch on however many implants”, because the four-implant version of the phrase belongs to a manufacturer. The codes underneath carry no brand at all, which is both a relief and a problem.
The cheapest quote is usually the least itemised one, and the difference between two arch prices is very often a difference in what is inside them. Here is how to compare like with like, and which genuinely cheaper routes exist.
Usually not, and where something does pay, it pays against codes with limits attached. Medicare names implants among the things it does not cover; Medicaid leaves adult dental benefits to the states; and one published schedule prints every implant code at zero.
An arch is one jaw. A mouth has two of them. Every prosthesis code in this work is priced per arch, so a quote that says “full mouth” and a quote that says “full arch” can differ by a factor of two while both look complete.
A full-arch implant case is a sequence, not an appointment: the remaining teeth come out, something is worn while the implants integrate, and the definitive prosthesis is made afterwards. The published integration window is three to six months.
“Snap-on dentures” describes a removable prosthesis that clips onto implants. “Implant-supported” is the family both the removable and the fixed versions belong to. The words get used interchangeably in advertising, and the prices are not interchangeable at all.
“Permanent dentures” is not a clinical category. It is how a fixed implant-supported prosthesis gets advertised, and the word describes how it is attached — not how long it lasts. The distinction changes what you are buying.
A photograph of somebody else’s arch shows appearance on one day, from one angle, chosen by the person selling the treatment. It cannot show fit, bite, bone, healing, maintenance or how the case looked three years later — which is most of what you wanted to know.