With dental implants becoming a more and more popular solution to replace missing teeth, it's fair to ask: how long do dental implants last? The short answer is that dental implants can last a lifetime. Here's the long answer.

The answer: Bone loss. A common legend says that an astronaut who returned to Earth after an extended stay on a space station had bones so weak that he broke his arm lifting a tea cup.

Perhaps the earliest example of dental implants were seashells found in the jaw of an ancient Mayan skeleton from 1,300 years ago.