If you have been told you need bone grafting before you can get dental implants, the next question is usually about the graft itself: what material will be used, and does the choice matter? A 2025 systematic review compared the graft materials used to prepare the jaw for implants, and its answer is reassuring for patients. For the most common graft choices, the review found their clinical advantages to be essentially the same, which means your clinician can choose the material that fits your case rather than chasing a single “best” product.
Why Bone Grafting Comes Before Implants
A dental implant needs enough healthy bone to hold it steady while it fuses with the jaw. Tooth loss, gum disease, infection, or simply time can shrink that bone, leaving too little height or width for an implant. Bone grafting rebuilds the missing bone, creating a stronger foundation so the implant can be placed in the right position for the crown that will sit on top of it.
Grafting takes several forms, from preserving the ridge right after a tooth is removed to lifting the sinus floor in the upper jaw. The material used is only one part of the plan. Just as important are the size and shape of the defect, the health of the surrounding tissue, and how long the graft is given to heal before the implant goes in.
The Graft Materials, in Plain Language
There are four broad families of graft material, and patients hear all of their names at consultations. An autograft is bone taken from your own body, often from another part of the jaw. It is traditionally called the gold standard because it is living bone, but it requires a second surgical site. An allograft is donated human bone tissue that has been processed and sterilized, so no second surgery is needed. A xenograft comes from an animal source, most commonly bovine bone that has been processed to remove organic material, leaving a mineral scaffold your own bone can grow into. An alloplast is a fully synthetic material, such as bioactive glass or a calcium-based ceramic, made in a laboratory.
Each family has trade-offs that have nothing to do with brand names. Your own bone integrates well but adds a donor site. Donor and animal-derived grafts avoid that second site but resorb, or melt away, at different rates. Synthetic grafts are consistent from batch to batch and carry no donor-tissue concerns, but they behave differently as they are replaced by your own bone. None of this makes one family right for every patient, which is exactly what the new review tested.
What the 2025 Review Did
The review, published in F1000Research in 2025 by Abushama and colleagues, set out to compare the clinical usefulness of xenografts and allografts used before dental implant placement. The researchers searched PubMed and the Cochrane Library for studies published between 2016 and 2024, using terms covering bone grafts, xenografts, allografts, and dental implants. From 340 studies found, only 12 met their strict inclusion criteria, covering 395 patients with a mean age in the early forties. The procedures in those studies included ridge preservation, delayed implant placement, immediate implant placement, and sinus augmentation, so the comparison spans the main situations where grafting is used.
By keeping the focus on adults receiving grafts ahead of implant surgery, the authors compared like with like as far as the available evidence allows.
What the Review Found
The headline finding is simple: the advantages of the synthetic xenograft and synthetic allograft materials studied were essentially the same. The review points to Bio-Oss, a widely used bovine-derived xenograft, and PerioGlas, a bioactive glass allograft-type material, as performing equivalently in the included studies.
What it does say is that, for the xenograft-versus-allograft comparison ahead of implant placement, the evidence does not support ranking one above the other on clinical usefulness. When two materials perform the same, the deciding factors become your anatomy, the type of defect, the healing time available, and your clinician’s experience with the material.
What This Means for Your Implant Plan in Roseville
If your implant plan includes grafting, the most productive questions at your consultation are not about brand names. Ask how much bone is missing and where, what kind of defect it is, how long the graft will need to heal, and whether the implant can be placed at the same time as the graft or needs to wait. Ask what will happen if the graft does not build as much bone as hoped, and what the fallback plan is. Those answers shape your outcome far more than the label on the graft material.
Many grafts need months to mature into bone strong enough for an implant, and rushing that stage risks an implant placed in bone that is not ready. A plan that looks slower on paper is often the plan that gives the implant its best chance. A prosthodontist in Roseville can walk you through your scans and explain which graft approach fits your bone, rather than offering a one-size material for every case.
At Expert Dental Group, Dr. Leila Nikpour is a prosthodontist with more than 15 years of dentistry experience, and the practice has placed 2,500+ dental implants. In-house 3D CBCT imaging means the bone available for your implant is measured in three dimensions before any graft or implant decision is made.
Visit Expert Dental Group
Expert Dental Group is located at 5070 Foothills Blvd, Suite 2, Roseville, CA 95747. Call (916) 888-1646 to schedule your free implant consultation. Hours: Monday–Friday 9–6, Saturday 9–1.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is bone grafting for dental implants?
Bone grafting rebuilds jawbone that has shrunk after tooth loss or gum disease, creating enough strong bone to support a dental implant in the right position.
Which bone graft material is best before implants?
A 2025 systematic review comparing xenografts and allografts ahead of implant placement found their clinical advantages essentially the same, so the best choice depends on your defect, anatomy, and healing time rather than a single product.
Does bone grafting require bone from my own body?
Not always. Your own bone is one option, but donor bone, animal-derived bone, and synthetic materials are all commonly used and avoid a second surgical site.
How long does a bone graft need to heal before an implant?
Healing time varies with the size of the defect and the material used, and many grafts need several months to mature into bone strong enough for an implant. Your clinician will judge readiness from follow-up imaging, not from the calendar alone.
Does grafting make implant treatment much longer overall?
It can add months to the timeline, but that time protects the result: an implant placed in properly rebuilt bone has a far better foundation than one placed where bone was insufficient.
References
Abushama AA, Alim N, AlTuraiki AM, et al. Comparison of xenograft and allograft bone graft for oral and maxillofacial surgical preparation prior to dental implantation: A systematic review. F1000Research. 2025;14:718. DOI: https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.163924.1